Latest / Space Nuts: Astronomy Insights & Cosmic Discoveries / #405: Martian Mysteries & Moon-Sized Marvels: Unveiling Mars' Ancient Atmosphere & The Tiniest Exoplanet

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#405: Martian Mysteries & Moon-Sized Marvels: Unveiling Mars' Ancient Atmosphere & The Tiniest Exoplanet · Space Nuts: Astronomy Insights & Cosmic Discoveries

0:00
Hi there, Thanks for joining us. This is Space Nuts. My name
0:03
is Andrew Dunkley, your host. It's really good to have your company.
0:07
On this episode, we're going to be looking into a new report that suggests
0:13
that, you know, things happened on Mars a long time ago that have
0:18
added more evidence to the possibility that it could have harbored life or at least
0:23
started to make progress towards having some form of life. And it involves a
0:30
chemical I suppose that you know and probably don't love. We're also going to
0:36
be looking at the smallest exoplanet ever found. Will it retain that title for
0:41
long? The word is possibly not. Will explain why very soon on this
0:47
episode of Space Nuts fifteen, Channel ten nine ignition sequence Space Nuts or three
0:58
two one Street Nurse when I've re bought it. Neil's good and joining us
1:06
to talk about all of that and much much more is Professor Fred Watson,
1:08
an astronomer at large. Hello Fred, Hello Andrews. Yes, still at
1:12
large. Everybody thinks it's a joke total, but it's actually that's my job.
1:18
Yeah it is. Yes, Well used to be in astronomer in charge,
1:22
but there was no one to be in charge of after a while.
1:25
Well, I had to had to redesignate you, yah, something like that.
1:32
It happens, It happens. So how you been, I mean to
1:36
the unwary. We've been together every week for the last several weeks, but
1:38
I've actually just come back from Egypt, so you have, and I'm very
1:44
anxious to hear how it went. Well, I'll start with the bad news.
1:49
I think I caught COVID, so I spent most of that trip actually
1:56
under the weather. But on top of that, what a fascinating place,
2:01
what incredible history, and I don't know what to tell you was the best
2:07
thing I saw the Pyramids and the Sphinx go without saying the Valley of the
2:13
Kings was extraordinary, getting down into the tombs in the Valley of the Kings
2:16
and seeing the elaborate artwork and the hieroglyphics, and and some of the things
2:23
that they did to try and trick the grave robbers, like little sand traps
2:31
and wells and false sarcophagus and false walls, and just so many amazing things
2:38
that they did to ward off the looters. The Civilization Museum was an eye
2:44
opener for me because that's where the mummies are. There's only actually one mummy
2:49
that's remained in the Valley of the Kings. Do you know which one it
2:52
was? I don't know, couldn't is the way they pronounce it. Yeah,
3:01
he's still there because his body is too delicate to move around. The
3:07
rest of them are in a museum in Cairo called the Civilization Museum. Highly
3:13
recommend that because you can actually go down under the main exhibition flow and walk
3:20
from one chamber to another and get up close and personal with the pharaohs and
3:28
they're all there. They're all there, all the Ramesses. There's a whole
3:32
bunch of them, including the famous Rameses, the second and just so many
3:40
And yeah, real eye opener. Luxor, I really I really liked Luxor
3:47
and the temples. I'm pretty well templed out. I don't have any we
3:51
went to, but we saw a lot. But they but they're all part
3:54
of the story and that's what it was about to try and piece together this
3:59
amazing hit street. We even went to a granite quarry where they mind pink
4:03
granite to create those famous obelisks. And is that the one where there's anobylisk
4:11
that's still half finished? Yeah, And it's split, it broke, so
4:15
it's still lying down in Lindown, Yes, in the ground, not completely
4:21
cut out of the ground. So they've given up their project. But can
4:25
I show you something hang on a s wherever I go, if there's a
4:29
rock worth collecting, I get one. So that that is a piece of
4:34
pink granite from the ancient granite quarry in Luxow. You've probably just broken the
4:43
law, probably showing the start it kind of get space onl of the court.
4:47
It's allegedly a piece of allegedly Yeah, yeah, but yeah, what
4:56
an amazing place. And we did a river cruise on the night island,
5:00
spent three nights on the boat, and then we went to a red Sea
5:03
resort and hung out there. Someone said to me, someone said to me,
5:09
I'll be really keen to see how you feel when you come back as
5:15
to whether or not you really believe the Egyptians could have built the Pyramids.
5:19
That's a really that's not a nice question. Yeah. I think Cairo surprised
5:28
me. I didn't expect it to be quite as what's the term, quite
5:34
as third world as it was, and yet just up the road they're building
5:40
New Cairo, which is modern and dynamic, and there is an astronomical connection
5:46
there, Fred that you were telling us. Yes, So of course when
5:50
we were there in twenty eighteen, part of our tour, which money put
5:57
in especially for me, it was to visit a telescope. It's actually quite
6:00
close to my house. It's a big telescope at a place called Kotamia,
6:05
if I remember rightly, it's hell onan is the nearest is the nearest place.
6:14
It's seventy four inch telescope, a you know, a large one,
6:18
classic of its time. But unfortunately the new Cairo is going to essentially brighten
6:24
a bit skies to the extent because of light pollution, to the extent that
6:29
it won't be viable anymore, which is a great shame because telescope was last
6:30
a long time. This one was built in the fifties and it's still going
6:33
strong. Yeah. Yeah, well, having seen what they've done, I
6:39
was told two years ago it was nothing, it was just desert. And
6:42
now you've got this, just this megacity, thirteen lane highways. It's just
6:47
extraordinary what they've done. So yes, I do believe that the Egyptians built
6:50
the pyramids. Yeah, not Aliens, definitely, not Aliens. It wasn't
6:59
just I know I've spent a bit too much time on this, but I'll
7:01
just tell you a little bit about issues with language and translation. Had an
7:09
incident where I was We were staying at a hotel and I asked for the
7:15
Wi Fi password, so they gave me a menu. I twice asked for
7:20
white wine and got red wine. I once asked for coffee and got tea.
7:26
And we asked one of our guides what the length of the Gaza Road
7:29
was, because you know, obviously we're interested in where Gaza was, and
7:31
he said, that's the Gaza Road and it's five thousand kilometers long, and
7:36
I went, yeah, maybe not seeing Gaza was three hundred and fifty kilometers.
7:42
And the other funny thing we asked him the population of Cairo, and
7:48
I think he knew, but he couldn't put it into the right words,
7:51
so apparently there are thirty thousand people living in Cairo. A bit. It
8:00
was a lot of those language issues as well. It was Yeah, it
8:03
was definitely an amazing trip, and we felt safe. You know, they're
8:09
very careful over there and never really felt there were any issues or dangers,
8:16
and they take security pretty seriously. Too, so yeah, it was it
8:20
was a good trip. Pide I got sick early and had to live with
8:24
that all the way through. And now jet lag. So I'm sitting here
8:28
with both at the moment. So apologies if I disappear, and it's okay,
8:35
it's just it's just mucus, nothing of Now we've got a lot to
8:41
do and I've bart a lot of time, so let's get into our first
8:45
topic. And this has everything to do with Mars and it's past and the
8:52
possibility that it could have, at some stage in its history harbored life.
8:56
And a new paper has been published which adds a little bit more weight to
9:01
that theory. Yes, that's right, and it comes from japan Japanese researchers
9:07
who've done some modeling of what Mars's ancient atmosphere might have been like and what
9:18
they've what they've done, and by that I mean the period I think it's
9:22
called the Noatian period if I remember something like that anyway, against what is
9:28
the no Ocean period. Now, yes, that's right. And when there
9:33
was there was liquid water on the surface because the pressure was higher than it
9:37
is now, the temperature was warmer than it is now. And what we're
9:41
talking about is a period. In fact it is it's that early period from
9:46
about three point eight to three point six billion years ago. And once these
9:50
scientists have done is looked at the kind of gases that are coming out of
9:54
volcanoes and what they contain. And basically you've got things like hydrogen, carbon
10:03
monoxide, carbon dioxide, and water. And they've sort of envisage that these
10:11
chemicals would have been in Mars's early atmosphere, and what they've modeled is how
10:20
they would change. And it turns out that because of solar radiation, the
10:24
photons that come from the sun, you get chemical reactions. For example,
10:28
carbon dioxide turns into carbon monoxide, hydrogen, sorry, water turns into hydrogen
10:35
and oxygen. You put all these things together and you get formaldehyde, which
10:41
is very well known chemical that we think of as a preservative for specimens in
10:48
jars. Did the Egyptians use for maldehyde? I wouldn't be surprised, I
10:52
think so it's probably in mummification. Yes, that's right. So when you
11:01
take when you take that modeling, yes you get formaldehyde. You you can
11:07
probably then dissolve that in the you know, the water oceans. But either
11:15
way, the existence of formaldehyde basically means that you've got a sort of and
11:22
let's do the Egyptian thing again, a Rosetta stone for some of the some
11:28
of the other molecules that could form from formaldehyde reacting with different other different chemicals
11:37
to form carbon rich molecules, the sorts of things that we think of associated
11:43
with life, like amino acids and things of that sort. So this this
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research again, it's it's sort of, I suppose, leaning towards the optimistic
11:56
side regarding life on Mars. One of there is searchers. There's a lovely
12:01
quote here and I'm reading from Cyitech Daily. In this particular story, the
12:07
researcher says, our research provides crucial insights into the chemical processes that may have
12:13
occurred on ancient Mars, offering valuable clues to the possibility of past life on
12:18
the planet. This is Shunga Kayama, and that's the lead author of the
12:24
study. And so it's basically, you know, it's broadening their research,
12:31
broadening the level of possibilities that we have for the formation of what we would
12:39
call biomolecules, you know, the molecules that basically go into living organisms.
12:46
Now we're finding those all over the place. We find the modern comets and
12:50
even asteroids. But to find a reaction that can actually generate these chemicals on
12:56
the surface of ancient Mars is I think a step forward. It's a very
13:01
interesting piece of research, and once again it provides some optimism for people who
13:07
are looking for perhaps in the end, when we get the samples back from
13:11
from Perseverance, we might be looking for evidence of past living organisms fossilized perhaps
13:20
in the dust and soil of Mars. Yes, that's the sixty four thousand
13:26
dollars question, isn't it. And this just seems to add a little bit
13:30
more fuel to the fire. Yes, that's right, it does indeed,
13:33
which is Yeah, it's an interesting step and a nice piece of research,
13:39
and look tevist, but I admire people who can work out what these reactions
13:43
are and tell you what comes out at the end. Yeah, I suppose
13:48
we should add a kad it and say they're basing this on a few assumptions.
13:52
Yes, sometimes you have to do so. It's not an absolute,
13:56
but the assumptions are fairly sound. Yes, and that is the existing conditions
14:03
on Mars at the time. But yeah, we know in its history it
14:07
probably had liquid oceans, it was warmer, and now this could add another
14:13
little piece to the life puzzle we'll be expounding, and hopefully in the not
14:20
too distant future we will have answers. Yeah, all about the answers,
14:24
or the nearest thing we'll get to answers will be when these samples come back
14:28
from Perseverance, which I think it's laid a cash of something like is it
14:35
happened in samples of Mars. I know that the planning for the recovery mission
14:43
for these is in trouble in terms of finances and things. This is meant
14:50
to be a joint DES NASA mission. I think it was originally scheduled for
14:54
twenty twenty eight. I think there's issues with that haven't followed up on them,
14:58
but it looks as though people are raising questions above it, so we'll
15:03
we'll have to see how that goes. It is a very important mission,
15:07
of course, to bring back for the first time sometimes of Martian Martian soil.
15:11
Yeah, I still kind of shake my head about the fact that they
15:15
created such a fabulous mission to collect the samples, but you know, they
15:18
put the collection idea on the back burner, and it's still on the back
15:24
burner, so I hope it won't stay there for very long. Yeah.
15:28
Well, you know, those things have been up there for billions of years.
15:31
It's they're not going to go away. No, that's right. I
15:33
think you know, we'll get around to it eventually. That's what people do,
15:39
That's what I do. Yeah, yeah, I'll get I'll get to
15:43
those weeds in the garden. Yeah. Yeah, there's a few things like
15:46
that. Actually, all right, if you would like to read up on
15:50
that story, as Fred suggested, the SI Tech Daily dot com website is
15:54
a great place to start. This is Space Nuts. Andrew Dunkley here with
15:58
Professor Fred. What's an Let's take a short break from the show to tell
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dot com slash space nuts. Now back to the show, Nuts. You
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are indeed with us, and we're grateful for that, so thank you.
20:22
Now it's time to look at things beyond our solar system, and a lot
20:29
of the time they are exoplanets, and we have now discovered the smallest exoplanet
20:36
ever found. Fred. This thing's yeah, I suppose it's really tiny,
20:41
but it's opened up that debate on Okay, is it a planet or is
20:45
it something else? Yeah, that's right, that's why it's in the news.
20:48
It's just the you know, the the question about whether this object,
20:53
which actually has been known for about ten years, I think, whether it
20:56
is a planet. So what do we talk about. We're talking about an
21:02
object called Kepler thirty seven B and it's an object that was discovered by the
21:07
Kepler mission, and we should just recap on that. It's now Kepler is
21:14
now not operating anymore. But that mission, which was incredibly successful, was
21:19
to measure the brightness of stars very very accurately and measure them over time.
21:23
I think they did it one hundred thousand stars at once, I remember,
21:27
rightly, and to look at the way the light from those stars varies,
21:32
and to detect when objects pass in front of those stars. So that means
21:40
you have to have a planetary system around the star that's actually aligned with the
21:44
direction back to Earth. And there's quite good statistics on how many you might
21:48
expect to find like that, but indeed it was so it was so many
21:52
that many thousands, I think it was three or four thousand planets were detected
21:57
by Kepler. As they passed in front of their parents, star caused a
22:02
dip. Next time round they passed in front of their parents, star caused
22:06
another dip. And I think if you get the third one, that's when
22:10
it is classified as a planet rather than being a suspective planet. So Kepler
22:15
was really successful at this, and the reason why it sort of revolutionized the
22:21
planet finding process was before that. Before Kepler, the main way of finding
22:26
planets was the Doppler up wobble method, where you're looking for wobbles in the
22:30
motion of the star backwards and forwards towards and away from you that have been
22:34
a bit caused by a planet pulling the star slightly out of place. Now,
22:41
that's a great way of finding big planets, but for little ones it's
22:45
pretty grim because the pull of a little planet is not very great on its
22:48
parent star. Whereas the Kepler method, what's called the transit method, because
22:52
the planet transits across the disc of the star, that is very sensitive to
22:57
actually quite small planets. And just to spill the beans on how big we
23:02
think it is, Kepler thirty seven B is actually about the same size as
23:07
the Moon, which is a quarture of the ASTHEYMITI now, so that's the
23:11
record breaker at the moment. But the question I guess that was raised was
23:18
is it really a planet? Yeah? Is it? You know? Is
23:22
it? Is it an asteroid or something that's not spherical? And that is
23:33
something that we Earthlings have defined through the Astronomical Union, and it has to
23:37
meet certain criteria to be defined a planet, which Pluto couldn't do anymore.
23:42
And that's why it was redesignated in two thousand and six. That's correct only
23:47
if I remember only the twenty third divorced. That was the date I think
23:52
of the vote, which was still controversial honestly, But my view, as
23:57
you well know, is that it was the right decision. So the criteria
24:02
and that this is the nub of this story. It's got to orbit a
24:07
start or the Sun in the case of the Solar System, it has to
24:11
be big enough that this process called differentiation has pulled it into a spherical shape.
24:18
In other words, its own gravity has overcome the resistance of the rock,
24:22
which is probably molten back in the day when it was being formed.
24:25
Its own gravity has overcome that resistance and pulled it into a sphere. But
24:30
the third criterion, and this is the one that Pluto fails on, is
24:33
that it's got to be the dominant object in its neighborhood. It's got to
24:37
have gravitationally cleared other objects out of the way, and if it hasn't done,
24:45
then it is a dwarf planet, which is why that new categorization was
24:51
introduced. Something that's very coal but hasn't become the dominant object, it's a
24:56
dwarf planet. And indeed Pluto isn't the dominant object. Other things that are
25:00
equal in size to Blueto are probably things that are bigger that we haven't found
25:03
yet out there in the depth of the Solar System. So that's the question
25:07
in relation to Kepler thirty seven B is it has it cleared its own area
25:15
of the region around its parents star, which is called Kepler thirty seven And
25:19
the answer is it's really hard to know that because the stuff that will be
25:23
around it will be very small. But I think that basically the upshot of
25:33
the research that is being described here. It's a scientist and I can't remember.
25:40
I think it's Thomas Barclay is the name, but I can't remember.
25:45
Yes, got our space Flight Center. Yes, its Barkley got our Space
25:49
Light Center, and in fact he Thomas was the first author of the paper
25:56
eleven years ago that actually identified that planet as being a planet, Kepler thirty
26:02
seven B. I think what has happened now is to look in more detail
26:12
at the star itself, because we can learn things about stars from a topic
26:19
that we don't often talk about Andrew, even though it's actually well pursued here
26:25
in Australia. There's a very strong group at Sydney University that look at this
26:29
topic. It's called astero seismology and it's about vibrations in stars. You can
26:36
even apply this to the Sun. The Sun's got I think they're about every
26:40
five minutes the Sun wobble slightly. Ye, it's a natural oscillation and you
26:44
can see those in the brightness of the star. And I think they've made
26:48
just by looking at the basically that these oscillations, what they've done is got
26:56
a better estimate of the diameter the mass of Kepler thirty seven B. And
27:04
essentially it is what we said about the size of the Moon, and that's
27:11
really the remaining place where we are at the moment. It's definitely that size
27:18
that the likelihood is its spherical because on objects in the size of the Moon,
27:22
what is it two and a half thousand kilometers or thereabout, it's actually
27:26
a bit more than that. It's getting up for three. Yes, it's
27:30
over three thousand, sorry, three thousand, two hundred or something like that.
27:34
That size it will have, it will have become a sphere, it
27:41
will have become verhical. The gravity is enough to pull it into that spherical
27:45
shape. So then really really remain in question as to whether the thirty seven
27:48
B qualifies as a planet is whether it's clear the region around it, And
27:53
the suspicion is because it's so close to its parents are it's very tense,
28:00
thirteen days to go around once. The likelihood is that that stuff is long
28:04
gone, and so I think are still old. In Kepler thirty seven B
28:12
up on a pedestal as the smallest planet known outside the Solar System, and
28:18
in fact it is the smallest planet because it's actually smaller than Mercury. But
28:25
we are looking forward to the launch in three years time of the Nancy Grace
28:30
Roman Space Telescope, which is a kind of hubble like telescope that's going to
28:33
do all sorts of interesting things, because it's got a wide field of view,
28:37
and that will be detecting exoplanets by a different a different method, not
28:44
the transit method, but one that has actually found favor from astronomers on Earth,
28:52
not just in space. It's called gravitational microlensing. And what happens is
28:59
if a planet passes in front of the light of a star, its gravity
29:07
changes the brightness of that star because this lensing process basically focuses the light its
29:15
Gravitational lensing is the phenomenon where space is distorted by a galaxy or a planet
29:22
or something like the Earth. Space is distorted by that, and what you
29:27
get is a lens in space, effectively a lens, and that can magnify
29:33
the light of a distant star. Gravitational micro lensing has been very successful in
29:40
finding new exoplanets, not as successful as the transit method. But if you've
29:45
got a big telescope looking out for these things, you might discover thousands of
29:49
exoplanets by this technique. And the Nunti Grace Roman space telescope I remember rightly,
29:55
it's about the same size as Soubble is, you know, on the
30:00
trail of this. So in a few years time, we might find another
30:03
huge troll of gravitationally micro lensed planets, and maybe we will find one smaller
30:11
than caple of thirty seven B. In fact, I think they are anticipating
30:15
that to probability, because this method they believe is going to catch quite a
30:22
big cluster of planets in the in this well, you know where are they
30:27
going to look? Exactly anywhere they can? Yeah, it's a it's a
30:32
really sensitive technique if for small planets. I might just add that colleagues in
30:41
New Zealand are actually particularly involved with this. With this technique, there are
30:45
various projects, all with quite entertaining names. I've tried to remember one of
30:52
them what it is, micro fun. That's it. Micro fun holifies them,
30:57
which I like another. So colleagues in this part of the world are
31:03
very active in that in that process, including some amateurs traunulers as well.
31:07
Okay, if you would like to read about the discovery of well, not
31:14
discovery of but the confirmation that thirty seven B Keppler thirty seven B is the
31:18
smallest exoplanet thus found, you can do that at space dot com. Fred.
31:26
We are done for another day, and I just remind people that you
31:33
can go to our website, have a bit of a peruse and get in
31:37
touch with in touch with us there, and don't forget. If you're a
31:40
YouTube follower and you watch us on YouTube, don't forget to hit that subscribe
31:45
button down below. Where is it again, Andrew? Where's that subscribe button
31:51
down? Fred? Thanks so much. We're done for another day. Sounds
32:00
good and I look forward to the next time, Andrew. Indeed, Professor
32:04
Fret Watson, astronomer at large part of the team here at Space Nuts the
32:07
podcast, and thanks to you in the studio, he's been basically sitting on
32:13
his hands for the last few weeks because he's had nothing to do. That's
32:17
different how I'm not sure anyway from me Andrew Dunkley, thanks for your company.
32:22
Catch you on the very next episode of Space Nuts. Bye bye.
32:27
You'll be listening to the Space Nuts podcast available at Apple Podcasts, Spotify,
32:34
iHeartRadio, or your favorite podcast player. You can also stream on demand at
32:38
bites dot com. This has been another quality podcast production from nights dot com.