Latest / Made of Stars / Supermassive Black Hole or Dark Matter?
Transcript
- 0:00Speaker 1: Warning.
- 0:00Speaker 2: The following podcast contains an entertaining look at astronomy, physics,
- 0:04Speaker 2: and space news throughout the known universe. Listeners have been
- 0:07Speaker 2: known to learn about astronomical phenomenon, the scientific method, and
- 0:10Speaker 2: expanded vocabulary to include terms like quasar, asterism and uranus. Listen,
- 0:15Speaker 2: that's your own risk.
- 0:16Speaker 1: Go ahead.
- 0:22Speaker 3: When made of stars, made them stars, made sizes. When
- 0:29Speaker 3: made of stars, you could be from high they would
- 0:36Speaker 3: New Mexicomus. Where are.
- 0:41Speaker 4: Stars? When we are made of stars?
- 0:57Speaker 5: I'm Wes Carrol, joined by my good friend, doctor Sewn Cruise,
- 1:00Speaker 5: an executive director of Columbus State University's Coca Cola Space
- 1:04Speaker 5: Sigence Center.
- 1:05Speaker 1: Hey Sean, Hey Wes.
- 1:06Speaker 3: It's good to be here today.
- 1:08Speaker 5: Eventually we get there. Eventually. Sometimes we had some technical difficulties,
- 1:13Speaker 5: but we are here and it just feels like a
- 1:15Speaker 5: technical difficulties kind of day, doesn't it. Sometimes it just
- 1:18Speaker 5: it's just in the air and there's nothing you can
- 1:21Speaker 5: really do about it.
- 1:21Speaker 3: It's just, you know, we're not the only ones that
- 1:24Speaker 3: have technical difficulties. I mean, you could talk about you know,
- 1:28Speaker 3: like a moon rocket that might be having some technical
- 1:30Speaker 3: difficulties at the moment, for instance.
- 1:32Speaker 1: For instance, that's a good you like.
- 1:34Speaker 3: Say, if you had a space podcast and you wanted
- 1:38Speaker 3: to talk about, like, you know, rockets that go to
- 1:40Speaker 3: the Moon, you can say, well, yeah, you know, we're
- 1:43Speaker 3: not alone and having technical difficulties because there's this very
- 1:47Speaker 3: large moon rocket that they're looking for leaks of hydrogen
- 1:50Speaker 3: on right now, and.
- 1:51Speaker 5: Yes, waiting for our next opportunity to launch all of
- 1:55Speaker 5: those things. It happens, That's right. It happened sometimes.
- 2:00Speaker 1: But now we're go. We are at that story in.
- 2:03Speaker 3: I mean maybe people already knew that so, but we
- 2:06Speaker 3: just wedged it in. It wasn't on the list.
- 2:07Speaker 1: That's true.
- 2:08Speaker 5: We talked about it last week, and we'll continue to
- 2:11Speaker 5: do follow ups with it as we get closer and closer.
- 2:13Speaker 5: I mean, I could point out the fact that like
- 2:16Speaker 5: seventy five percent at least of my household is sick.
- 2:21Speaker 5: The three people who don't work from home are currently
- 2:24Speaker 5: all at home, and the one who does work from
- 2:27Speaker 5: home is isolated in his studio, so that we can
- 2:30Speaker 5: do this. So I think about this, the fact that
- 2:35Speaker 5: these astronauts are at quarantine waiting, still waiting to go
- 2:39Speaker 5: next month. I guess they just stay in quarantine the
- 2:41Speaker 5: whole time.
- 2:41Speaker 3: They actually released them. They're going to re quarantine them
- 2:44Speaker 3: as what they're doing. So they have actually gotten to
- 2:46Speaker 3: go home, which is good.
- 2:47Speaker 1: Yeah, that's a.
- 2:48Speaker 3: Good thing, right, Yeah, So but you know, one can
- 2:52Speaker 3: imagine how much pleasure they'll feel when they have to
- 2:55Speaker 3: go back in the quarantine, you know, because they quarantine
- 2:58Speaker 3: them the first time anyway, So well, you know this
- 3:01Speaker 3: is the way it goes. Look, if you're gonna live
- 3:03Speaker 3: the astronaut life, you have to take the twists and turns,
- 3:07Speaker 3: the ups and downs, the quarantine and then second quarantine
- 3:12Speaker 3: and maybe.
- 3:12Speaker 1: Even a third quarantine if necessary.
- 3:14Speaker 5: And you have to also know that you're you're gonna
- 3:17Speaker 5: eat be eating freeze dried meals no matter whether you're
- 3:20Speaker 5: stuck or not.
- 3:21Speaker 1: That's just part of the way the meals work.
- 3:24Speaker 3: So you're telling me they don't get pilet mignon and
- 3:28Speaker 3: pasta carbon ea every night.
- 3:30Speaker 5: I mean, those space walks, they're not to go outside
- 3:32Speaker 5: and grill like I would think that you as long
- 3:34Speaker 5: as you're outdoors, you know.
- 3:36Speaker 3: Yeah, I mean that's right to grill a safe distance
- 3:40Speaker 3: away from the space station.
- 3:42Speaker 1: It's like at an apartment complex.
- 3:44Speaker 5: You can't do it on the balcony, but you can
- 3:46Speaker 5: get you know, within so many feet of the apartment,
- 3:48Speaker 5: and that's perfectly fine. Well, they're not the only people
- 3:52Speaker 5: that are waiting to go to space because they're going
- 3:56Speaker 5: a little you know, a better, longer trip, better trip arguably.
- 4:00Speaker 5: But I would think that some of the Crew twelve
- 4:04Speaker 5: people are just ready to get on with their mission.
- 4:07Speaker 5: And obviously Crew eleven came home with a medical emergency.
- 4:13Speaker 1: Do they ever use the word emergency?
- 4:14Speaker 5: I know at one point they kind of called an emergency,
- 4:16Speaker 5: but bringing them home, I would think it's safe to
- 4:18Speaker 5: say an emergency.
- 4:19Speaker 1: But anyway that brought I.
- 4:21Speaker 3: Think they were trying to purposely avoid using the word
- 4:24Speaker 3: emergency and called it things like I can't remember exact word,
- 4:29Speaker 3: but things like a medical situation or circumstance or these
- 4:32Speaker 3: kinds of words that were just a little less aggressive,
- 4:36Speaker 3: just a little bit less maybe emotionally charged wording for
- 4:40Speaker 3: that situation.
- 4:42Speaker 1: Crew eleven came home.
- 4:44Speaker 5: The current crew of the International Space Station has been
- 4:48Speaker 5: enjoying lots of extra space, probably not enjoying the extra
- 4:52Speaker 5: chores they have to do to keep things running up there. However,
- 4:57Speaker 5: some help is on the way. As Crew twelve getting
- 4:59Speaker 5: ready possible launching Friday.
- 5:02Speaker 3: What do you mean it's my turn to clean the
- 5:04Speaker 3: space toilet again? What? Well, there's only three of us.
- 5:08Speaker 3: Oh where are those other people? Oh? Yeah, well if
- 5:11Speaker 3: they're setting evacuation.
- 5:13Speaker 1: That's right.
- 5:13Speaker 5: If there's three of you, if you just clean it
- 5:15Speaker 5: each time, then nobody has to do the big clean, right, Like.
- 5:21Speaker 3: I hope that they have this philosophy that they share
- 5:23Speaker 3: among each other. I really hope that they're doing that.
- 5:26Speaker 1: So do they have their own separate attachment?
- 5:31Speaker 3: I would hope.
- 5:32Speaker 4: Yeah, Yeah, I'm saying so.
- 5:34Speaker 3: I mean, I don't think it's the one size fits
- 5:36Speaker 3: all world, right, so everybody has Yeah, so everybody has
- 5:38Speaker 3: their own attachment and they just have to clean it.
- 5:41Speaker 1: So yeah, it kind of is that, I guess.
- 5:43Speaker 3: I think, Yeah, the attachment points might vary for certain physiologies,
- 5:48Speaker 3: don't you know.
- 5:49Speaker 5: We have been doing this in some form for almost
- 5:52Speaker 5: twenty years, the two of us, And this is the
- 5:55Speaker 5: first time I think I've ever asked you any bathroom stuff.
- 5:59Speaker 5: I know it's the god for when field trips come
- 6:01Speaker 5: in and anybody's there in the building. You probably answer
- 6:04Speaker 5: toilet questions more than anything else, I'm assuming other than
- 6:08Speaker 5: when there's like a big event and people want to
- 6:10Speaker 5: know about, you know, an eclipse or something, but you
- 6:12Speaker 5: probably get more toilet question anything else.
- 6:14Speaker 1: I think that's my first toilet question i've made.
- 6:17Speaker 3: I can't remember a lot of them. I think we've
- 6:19Speaker 3: maybe addressed certain, you know, potty issues over the years,
- 6:23Speaker 3: but yeah, but maybe not like a direct like how
- 6:25Speaker 3: does this attach kind of question. I will tell you
- 6:29Speaker 3: that there was a certain Apollo astronaut who was here
- 6:33Speaker 3: who talked about one of his colleague Apollo astronauts just
- 6:37Speaker 3: kind of drifting through the command module tethered to the
- 6:41Speaker 3: very device that you're talking about, just hanging off of
- 6:44Speaker 3: his posterior, just free floating through space with that taped
- 6:49Speaker 3: in a certain location. So, yeah, that was a pretty
- 6:52Speaker 3: entertaining story. I'm gonna leave out the exact wording and
- 6:55Speaker 3: details that that certain Apollo astronaut used, but advice to
- 7:00Speaker 3: say it was colorful.
- 7:02Speaker 5: I have to ask was he actively using it while
- 7:06Speaker 5: he was floating through Is that what he was?
- 7:08Speaker 3: I don't know if he was, you know, this was
- 7:10Speaker 3: like if he was in the the batter's box in
- 7:14Speaker 3: the on deck circle.
- 7:15Speaker 1: I'm not really sure, all right? I mean was true,
- 7:19Speaker 1: I have a prep for a colonoscopy.
- 7:21Speaker 5: I could think where that would come in andy, Uh,
- 7:23Speaker 5: just walking around through the house.
- 7:25Speaker 3: I don't think it was an after use. It was
- 7:26Speaker 3: either like a before use or a durring.
- 7:31Speaker 5: There is no after use when it's a colonoscopy prep.
- 7:34Speaker 5: That's what I'm saying.
- 7:36Speaker 1: It's pretty much it's pretty much.
- 7:38Speaker 5: Use and then the colonoscopy there's not really a you
- 7:43Speaker 5: know anyway.
- 7:45Speaker 3: The first time listening to this podcast, friends, just know
- 7:48Speaker 3: that this is not this is not our approach every week.
- 7:53Speaker 1: That's true.
- 7:53Speaker 5: We have real stories to get to and we're about to.
- 7:56Speaker 5: But I just I just want to say this. Nobody
- 7:58Speaker 5: wants to deal with the prep, but you gotta do it.
- 8:01Speaker 5: Forty five. That's the age, guys, that's the age gals.
- 8:04Speaker 1: You gotta do it, all right.
- 8:06Speaker 5: So yeah, let's talk about Crew twelve because they are
- 8:11Speaker 5: getting ready to launch maybe the end of the week,
- 8:14Speaker 5: just in time for Valentine's four.
- 8:16Speaker 3: More people are getting ready to go up there to
- 8:18Speaker 3: help with these various chores that we were discussing, so
- 8:21Speaker 3: they'll be able to spread that around again a little bit.
- 8:24Speaker 3: Who are these four people, let's talk about that. So
- 8:27Speaker 3: the crew twelve astronauts from NASA, it's Jessic Kamir and
- 8:31Speaker 3: Jack Hathaway. From the European Space Agency, it's Sophie Adno
- 8:35Speaker 3: and from ros Cosmos Andre Fidi Aev. And that is
- 8:40Speaker 3: your upcoming share the chores Crew twelve heading for the
- 8:44Speaker 3: International Space Station. List of astronauts, cosmonauts and isonauts that
- 8:49Speaker 3: are heading up that direction. So they're getting ready to
- 8:53Speaker 3: launch from Pad forty at the Cape Canaveral Space Force Station.
- 8:58Speaker 3: It's not going to happen earlier than Friday of the
- 9:01Speaker 3: week that we're recording this, because let's see, the real headline,
- 9:04Speaker 3: your friends, is that they meant to launch this thing
- 9:06Speaker 3: earlier this week, in fact, even on Wednesday. But they've
- 9:10Speaker 3: been running into weather issues. And you might say, oh, yeah,
- 9:13Speaker 3: the weather in the US has been a bit tricky lately.
- 9:14Speaker 3: Well that's not the only place, because the real weather
- 9:19Speaker 3: issues that they're having a hang up are on the
- 9:22Speaker 3: emergency landing locations throughout Europe and across the Atlantic Ocean.
- 9:27Speaker 3: So whether in those locations has been not as good
- 9:30Speaker 3: as it needs to be to be able to launch
- 9:33Speaker 3: the mission safely. So that launch for the next crew
- 9:36Speaker 3: rotation mission of International Space Station has to wait to
- 9:39Speaker 3: know earlier than Friday, So at Friday at the earliest,
- 9:43Speaker 3: maybe even later than that. But NASA and SpaceX leadership
- 9:47Speaker 3: have determined the weather along the flight path unacceptable in
- 9:52Speaker 3: case of an emergency landing, so they're bumping it off.
- 9:55Speaker 3: To go to Steve Stitch, who is the NASA Commercial
- 9:59Speaker 3: Crew Program Manager, quote, we could see high winds along
- 10:03Speaker 3: a lot of that track, up to twenty four to
- 10:06Speaker 3: twenty eight knots, especially in what we would consider our
- 10:10Speaker 3: higher risk areas, the staging area, said Steve Stitch. There's
- 10:14Speaker 3: a low pressure system that's kind of moving in and
- 10:17Speaker 3: setting over that staging area, and it's driving those winds up,
- 10:22Speaker 3: and we can really see the models agreeing over the
- 10:24Speaker 3: last twenty four hours. Continuing to quote Steve Stitch, quote,
- 10:29Speaker 3: the good news is we have good opportunities for the
- 10:32Speaker 3: remainder of the week, and so we'll go ahead and
- 10:34Speaker 3: launch when we're ready we have favorable weather, when we're
- 10:41Speaker 3: good and ready, and when we have favorable weather, so
- 10:43Speaker 3: says Steve Stitch, Commercial Crew Program Manager and the person
- 10:47Speaker 3: overseeing the launch of Crew twelve for SpaceX and NASA.
- 10:52Speaker 5: Now, I just want to say this because I love
- 10:56Speaker 5: my bride. I know you love yours very much as well.
- 11:00Speaker 1: We are happily married, both of us to our brides.
- 11:07Speaker 5: And I just I'll just say that having Valentine's Day
- 11:12Speaker 5: on a Saturday is a giant pain.
- 11:16Speaker 1: So I'm looking at it.
- 11:17Speaker 5: Not only are they getting to go to Space, They're
- 11:19Speaker 5: they're getting to avoid so many people out on Valentine's
- 11:26Speaker 5: So I'm jealous for two reasons. I'm just saying that.
- 11:30Speaker 5: I mean, I mean, I love my wife. I would happily,
- 11:35Speaker 5: you know, I'd walk to the moon for her.
- 11:36Speaker 1: I would do that.
- 11:37Speaker 5: But you know the idea of going out for a
- 11:41Speaker 5: meal on Saturday Valentine's Day does not sound appealing to me.
- 11:45Speaker 3: Is that like the ultimate hall pass? I think so
- 11:49Speaker 3: like from Valentine's Day, like, oh I forgot your card.
- 11:51Speaker 3: Oh it's because I went to Space on the thirteenth,
- 11:56Speaker 3: to the moon Alice bang zoom. I mean because I
- 12:00Speaker 3: don't think it works, because then it's like, well you
- 12:01Speaker 3: should have thought of that, look at you going off
- 12:06Speaker 3: with going off with your part. But you know, I
- 12:08Speaker 3: thought we were gonna watch on the eleventh, going off
- 12:10Speaker 3: here up to the thirteenth.
- 12:11Speaker 1: Off with your friends.
- 12:13Speaker 3: Yeah, hang around in orbit.
- 12:16Speaker 1: That's right, just goofing off, I get it.
- 12:19Speaker 3: Just keep floating out there.
- 12:21Speaker 5: So they're set to go on Friday the thirteenth. We
- 12:24Speaker 5: got any worries about that, any concerns there's a.
- 12:27Speaker 3: Thing there too. I'm personally gonna just avoid the triska decophobia,
- 12:33Speaker 3: you know, angle, but you just never know really, so yeah.
- 12:37Speaker 5: I'm not even a little stitious, but that still makes
- 12:39Speaker 5: me a little weary, so you know it.
- 12:42Speaker 3: Yeah, thirteen has not been a great number for NASA.
- 12:45Speaker 5: No, well, let's about five for a number as NASA
- 12:52Speaker 5: ready to use AXIOUM Space fifth private mission to the
- 12:56Speaker 5: Space station. And again this is not the one with
- 12:59Speaker 5: Tom Cruise, right.
- 13:00Speaker 3: Yeah, I think Tom is out.
- 13:03Speaker 1: I think that's officially done.
- 13:05Speaker 5: But it does feel like, since it was talked about
- 13:08Speaker 5: years ago, we should continue to say, well, when is
- 13:11Speaker 5: Tom going up there?
- 13:12Speaker 3: When is Tom going? And he wrote Tom wants to
- 13:14Speaker 3: go to space.
- 13:15Speaker 5: I would want to go about Tom. I mean, if
- 13:17Speaker 5: you get to start sprinting, he could probably get most
- 13:19Speaker 5: of the way there on his feet.
- 13:22Speaker 3: I bet when Tom's doing some of his workouts. He's thinking, now,
- 13:24Speaker 3: this would be really good for when I go to space.
- 13:26Speaker 3: Oh wait, that plans on hold anyway. Well be that
- 13:31Speaker 3: as it may. Axiom is going back to space. So
- 13:33Speaker 3: the ax five mission the fifth private mission to the
- 13:38Speaker 3: space station, taking what we would call commercial astronauts because
- 13:44Speaker 3: they're astronauts. They're actually going up and doing work on
- 13:47Speaker 3: the International Space Station. You can't call him not astronauts,
- 13:52Speaker 3: spaceflight participant. It's a little different than those people just
- 13:56Speaker 3: go up for six minutes in a joy ride taking snowfield.
- 14:00Speaker 3: I'm gonna still call them. They need some kind of designation.
- 14:03Speaker 1: Yeah, that's true.
- 14:05Speaker 3: But these people will actually be doing work aboard the
- 14:08Speaker 3: International Space Station, including experiments which I think make me,
- 14:12Speaker 3: may make some people nervous anyway, but that's okay, it
- 14:14Speaker 3: doesn't matter. So NASA and Space Axiom Space have signed
- 14:18Speaker 3: an order for the fifth private astronaut mission to the
- 14:21Speaker 3: International Space Station. This according to NASA dot Gov Axiom.
- 14:25Speaker 3: The Axiom mission is targeted no earlier than January twenty
- 14:31Speaker 3: twenty seven, so it's not just around the corner. It's
- 14:35Speaker 3: a little ways off, but it'll launch from Kennedy Space
- 14:38Speaker 3: Center in Florida. And according to Jaredisigman, we like quoting Jaredisigman.
- 14:43Speaker 3: Why because he's finally the NASA administrator, That's why, all right? So,
- 14:46Speaker 3: Jared Eisenwan says this quote, the award of our fifth
- 14:49Speaker 3: private astronaut mission shows that commercial space is not a
- 14:54Speaker 3: distant promise but a present reality. Good quote from Jared.
- 14:59Speaker 3: I like that one. He goes on to say, Jaredisenwind quote.
- 15:02Speaker 3: By expanding access and sharpening competition in low Earth orbit,
- 15:06Speaker 3: these missions are building the capabilities NASA will rely on
- 15:09Speaker 3: as we move out to the Moon, Mars and beyond.
- 15:12Speaker 3: We look forward to building upon those capabilities with many
- 15:17Speaker 3: private astronaut missions to come. Unquote, so says to Jared
- 15:22Speaker 3: in his new role as administrator of NASA. So Axium
- 15:27Speaker 3: five mission is expected to spend about fourteen days aboard
- 15:30Speaker 3: the space station, and again a specific launch date will
- 15:33Speaker 3: depend on overall spacecraft traffic. Now there's traffic up there.
- 15:37Speaker 3: Now you gotta worry about the traffic at the space station.
- 15:41Speaker 3: So many ships, so many all right, So specific launch
- 15:44Speaker 3: date will depend on the overall traffic at the overall
- 15:46Speaker 3: outpost and other planning considerations, possibly like the weather or
- 15:51Speaker 3: stuck hydrogen valves, whatever those things may be. So there
- 15:54Speaker 3: you go. That's the latest on the AX five mission
- 15:57Speaker 3: from accidom.
- 15:58Speaker 5: More Made of Stars right after this, further proving that
- 16:22Speaker 5: we are in fact in a space race for sure
- 16:26Speaker 5: when it comes to the Moon. And for anybody who
- 16:28Speaker 5: thinks we got to slow things down, we need to
- 16:31Speaker 5: slow down. Why are we in such a rush to
- 16:33Speaker 5: get back to the moon. China's now a step closer.
- 16:37Speaker 3: Yeah, the serious story from space news dot com China
- 16:40Speaker 3: took a step closer to their moon aspirations putting humans
- 16:44Speaker 3: on the Moon from China. So headline from space news
- 16:48Speaker 3: dot com say is this China tests crewed spacecraft will
- 16:51Speaker 3: abort and rocket recovery in major lunar milestone. So China
- 16:57Speaker 3: took the step forward and it's lunaric human spaceflight programs
- 17:01Speaker 3: late Tuesday with a successful in flight abort and rocket
- 17:06Speaker 3: recovery tests. All right, So I'm just kind of reading
- 17:10Speaker 3: you some of the wording from space news dot com.
- 17:13Speaker 3: But really what they're doing is that they're doing basically
- 17:15Speaker 3: the same thing that we did with our Orion spacecraft
- 17:19Speaker 3: back in twenty nineteen. It's making sure that it as
- 17:23Speaker 3: the rocket lifts off the launch pad with humans aboard
- 17:27Speaker 3: the top of it in their spacecraft, which is actually
- 17:30Speaker 3: a very small piece of a moon rocket, that you
- 17:33Speaker 3: can separate that capsule and get those people out away
- 17:38Speaker 3: from that giant rocket if something begins to go wrong
- 17:42Speaker 3: with the giant rocket. And the way it works for
- 17:45Speaker 3: an Orion spacecraft is above the actual Orion capsule itself,
- 17:51Speaker 3: there's a large tower. That large tower looks a bit
- 17:54Speaker 3: like a cell phone tower or some kind of a
- 17:56Speaker 3: gantry sticking straight up, but if you look at it carefully,
- 17:59Speaker 3: you'll notice it's got some little rocket engines are around
- 18:02Speaker 3: the outside of it, and those rocket engines are designed
- 18:06Speaker 3: that if there is some reason that the big rocket
- 18:10Speaker 3: has to be aborted, that they can fire those rockets
- 18:13Speaker 3: on the on the gantry post portion above the capsule,
- 18:18Speaker 3: and that that tower will remove the capsule out away
- 18:21Speaker 3: from the big rocket, carry it very rapidly somewhere else
- 18:25Speaker 3: to safety, while the giant rocket could potentially be exploding
- 18:29Speaker 3: behind them. So again that's you don't want to have
- 18:33Speaker 3: that happen because there's a lot of g force involved.
- 18:38Speaker 3: It's like it's like in your car. You don't want
- 18:40Speaker 3: to have the air bags go off, because those air
- 18:42Speaker 3: bags are gonna snap so fast that they could cause
- 18:45Speaker 3: injuries to your hands, your face, your upper chest. But
- 18:49Speaker 3: those injuries, in comparison to the wreck you're about to
- 18:52Speaker 3: have in your car, might be the acceptable choice. Well,
- 18:56Speaker 3: that's the same thing with this little tower that sits
- 18:59Speaker 3: on top of these rockets. Yes, you would probably suffer
- 19:02Speaker 3: some level of discomfort to injury based on having to
- 19:07Speaker 3: remove your capsule from the rocket in a very rapid manner,
- 19:11Speaker 3: but you have a good a better chance, shall we say,
- 19:14Speaker 3: of surviving the whole event and just getting out in
- 19:17Speaker 3: a way. So again we tested that for our lunar rocket,
- 19:20Speaker 3: the space launch system with its Orion capsule back in
- 19:23Speaker 3: twenty nineteen. China has now tested theirs on February eleventh,
- 19:29Speaker 3: So now the Long March ten rocket and their meng
- 19:35Speaker 3: Jiao spacecraft have gone through that same test. It was successful.
- 19:40Speaker 3: The meng Jiao descended by assisted into the sea by
- 19:44Speaker 3: its parachutes and all of that happened successfully, and again
- 19:49Speaker 3: no people on board. It was just a test of
- 19:51Speaker 3: the system. But then the rocket, the Long March ten itself,
- 19:55Speaker 3: flew out to its recovery point that was also successful.
- 20:00Speaker 3: Instruation was a crucial next step in China's plans to
- 20:03Speaker 3: attempt to land astronauts on the Moon by twenty thirty. So,
- 20:08Speaker 3: as Wes said at the beginning of the story, it
- 20:10Speaker 3: is a race. They're setting dates. Their dates are a
- 20:14Speaker 3: little bit later than ours, but we're also having delays.
- 20:17Speaker 3: So yeah, it's really an interesting time. It's a brand
- 20:21Speaker 3: new moon race, and the outcome is still yet to
- 20:24Speaker 3: be determined.
- 20:26Speaker 5: All right, So for a long time now we have
- 20:30Speaker 5: thought basically, middle of the Milky Way there's a supermassive
- 20:34Speaker 5: black hole. Now some science says maybe not so fast,
- 20:40Speaker 5: it could be something else.
- 20:42Speaker 3: So think about this as a paradigm shift. Like you
- 20:49Speaker 3: have bands like news writing songs called super massive black hole.
- 20:53Speaker 3: Why do you have that, Well, because we know that
- 20:56Speaker 3: there are such things, and we've taught generations of students. Now, hey,
- 21:01Speaker 3: you know what's at the middle of almost every galaxy
- 21:02Speaker 3: a super massive black hole. They're different than your garden
- 21:07Speaker 3: variety black hole because the garden variety black hole has
- 21:10Speaker 3: a mass of you know, maybe eight to ten to
- 21:14Speaker 3: twenty times the mass of our sun. Well, these are
- 21:20Speaker 3: million solar mass black holes that we have long talked about,
- 21:25Speaker 3: and the location at the center of our galaxy is
- 21:29Speaker 3: something called Sagittarius A. That's because in the direction of
- 21:33Speaker 3: the constellation of Sagittarius the very first radio source ever discovered.
- 21:38Speaker 3: Hence the A was long believed to be a super
- 21:42Speaker 3: massive black hole generating radio waves. Well, it's interesting when
- 21:48Speaker 3: science comes up with just a whole different, out of
- 21:51Speaker 3: the box perspective that says, you know, maybe these things
- 21:56Speaker 3: that we've thought existed all this time, maybe they don't
- 22:00Speaker 3: exist at all. Maybe there are other some other form
- 22:05Speaker 3: of exotic matter, not a black hole, but a giant
- 22:11Speaker 3: lump of dark matter. Now, without going into depth on
- 22:18Speaker 3: particle physics, there are kinds of dark matter that have
- 22:24Speaker 3: been postulated that are what we would refer to as
- 22:28Speaker 3: exotic particles here on the Earth. They're not particles that
- 22:31Speaker 3: we are familiar with in terms of the kind of
- 22:35Speaker 3: material that make up our own bodies, you know, just
- 22:38Speaker 3: atoms and protons and neutrons, electrons. They can be more
- 22:41Speaker 3: exotic things than that, different types of both bosons and fermions.
- 22:47Speaker 3: And again, without going into the depths of particle physics,
- 22:51Speaker 3: just say these are these are non garden variety forms
- 22:57Speaker 3: of matter, and if they're out there in large numbers,
- 23:01Speaker 3: they could be making up the components of what we
- 23:04Speaker 3: have referred to over the last couple of decades as
- 23:06Speaker 3: this weird stuff called dark matter. Why is it dark
- 23:08Speaker 3: because we can't see it and it doesn't really interact
- 23:11Speaker 3: with light, yet it seems to be there and affecting
- 23:14Speaker 3: the gravity of everything around. Well. There's been a several
- 23:18Speaker 3: published research articles, but a new one that just came
- 23:21Speaker 3: out in what's called the Monthly Notices of the Royal
- 23:24Speaker 3: Astronomical Society. It's from a group of astrophysicists in Argentina,
- 23:30Speaker 3: from the Institute of Astrophysics in Argentina and Laplata, Argentina,
- 23:34Speaker 3: and they've come out with a new idea to say,
- 23:36Speaker 3: what if instead of a black hole, what if you
- 23:39Speaker 3: had a giant assembly of nothing but dark matter in
- 23:45Speaker 3: the center of the Milky Way, And could that actually
- 23:49Speaker 3: produce all of the things that we can measure that
- 23:53Speaker 3: we've long associated with Sagittarius A being a supermassive black hole,
- 23:59Speaker 3: like you have the velocities of stars around it. Could
- 24:03Speaker 3: you have the magnetic field that's responsible for generating the
- 24:06Speaker 3: radio waves, could you have all of these components? And
- 24:09Speaker 3: the latest study has come out and suggested that many
- 24:13Speaker 3: of the kinds of things that we have measured here
- 24:17Speaker 3: on Earth and we have associated with properties of a
- 24:19Speaker 3: super massive black hole can in fact be created by
- 24:23Speaker 3: large collections of non normal or fermionic dark matter. All right, so,
- 24:31Speaker 3: Valentina Crespy, one of the researchers from the Institute for
- 24:35Speaker 3: Astrophysics in Laplata in Argentina, said this, according to Universe
- 24:40Speaker 3: today dot com. Quote, surrounding Sagittarius A, a star cluster
- 24:45Speaker 3: of young and massive stars, coexist with a population of
- 24:49Speaker 3: dust and shrouded objects whose astrometric data can be used
- 24:53Speaker 3: to scrutinize the nature of Sagittarius A. An alternative to
- 24:58Speaker 3: the black hole scenario has been recently proposed in terms
- 25:03Speaker 3: of a super massive compact object composed of self gravitating
- 25:09Speaker 3: fermionic dark matter unquote. And again without going into the
- 25:16Speaker 3: depths of all of the things that they're measuring, they
- 25:19Speaker 3: have associated many of the measurements that we make here
- 25:22Speaker 3: on Earth that we have assumed we're coming from a
- 25:25Speaker 3: super massive black hole with this giant, self gravitating fermionic
- 25:30Speaker 3: dark matter lump. So if that can continue to be
- 25:36Speaker 3: validated with new series of observations, this would be one
- 25:40Speaker 3: of those moments where maybe we need to rewrite the
- 25:44Speaker 3: textbooks about how galaxies form, what's at the center of
- 25:48Speaker 3: those galaxies, and what produces the initial gravity that caused
- 25:52Speaker 3: galaxies to aggregate in the first place. And this is
- 25:56Speaker 3: just why I'm not saying any of this is true.
- 25:58Speaker 3: I'm just saying a reasonable hypothesis with some kind of
- 26:04Speaker 3: some kind of reinterpretation of observations we've already made, is
- 26:08Speaker 3: being put forth. And when that happens, that's when science
- 26:12Speaker 3: really needs to take a close look at what they've
- 26:14Speaker 3: assumed to be true and go out and do measurements
- 26:17Speaker 3: to find out if it's indeed true, because it has
- 26:20Speaker 3: a challenger in terms of the theoretical idea. Really fun
- 26:24Speaker 3: stuff and exactly the way science works.
- 26:27Speaker 1: More made of stars.
- 26:28Speaker 5: Right after this, all right, let's now transition over to
- 26:52Speaker 5: what's going on at Columbus State University's co Cola Space
- 26:54Speaker 5: Science Center with a another astronomy night coming up on
- 26:58Speaker 5: the twenty first Saturday, And then I guess you guys
- 27:03Speaker 5: have kind of a long day in store for you
- 27:05Speaker 5: on March the third. Not only is that the lunar eclipse,
- 27:08Speaker 5: which is not conveniently timed, can they reschedule that? It's
- 27:12Speaker 5: also a day for music under the Dome. So it's
- 27:16Speaker 5: a long day for you guys coming up on March third.
- 27:18Speaker 3: It's gonna be a long day for some of us.
- 27:20Speaker 3: And some of us might be named Sean that day,
- 27:23Speaker 3: but that's okay, that's fine. I don't mind being there.
- 27:26Speaker 3: So we are in the process of negotiations with two
- 27:31Speaker 3: different parking garages because that's where we're going to set
- 27:35Speaker 3: up for the lunar eclipse. And the reason is because
- 27:38Speaker 3: that lunary eclipse is setting while it goes into eclipse.
- 27:41Speaker 3: In other words, we need a high location, like the
- 27:44Speaker 3: roof of a parking garage, so we can look down
- 27:47Speaker 3: low as the sun sets, hopefully not behind trees, which
- 27:50Speaker 3: is why we're going to be on top of the
- 27:51Speaker 3: parking garage so that we can see the moon. So
- 27:54Speaker 3: by the time we do this podcast next, I will
- 27:56Speaker 3: have that venue to announce everybody. But we will be
- 27:59Speaker 3: doing on March third an observation of the lunar eclips
- 28:05Speaker 3: and we will be on one parking garage or another
- 28:08Speaker 3: companion who gives us permission, and we'll make that announcement
- 28:12Speaker 3: by next week. So you know, if you're in the
- 28:15Speaker 3: Greater Columbus area and you want to get up and
- 28:16Speaker 3: see the lunary eclipse, we will be somewhere where you
- 28:19Speaker 3: can join us, and we will tell you next time
- 28:21Speaker 3: here on the podcast. In the meantime, as Wes said,
- 28:23Speaker 3: there is an Astronomy Night on February twenty first, and
- 28:26Speaker 3: there are astronomy nights coming up all throughout the spring.
- 28:29Speaker 3: If you want to know that schedule, get online go
- 28:32Speaker 3: to www dot CCSSC dot org. Charlie Charlie SamSam Charlie
- 28:38Speaker 3: dot Org's the website for the Space Science Center and
- 28:41Speaker 3: you can find out about the astronomy nights, the music
- 28:44Speaker 3: under the Dome schedule, including March the third, and also
- 28:48Speaker 3: our Georgia Stem Day which is happening on March fourteenth.
- 28:52Speaker 3: We just posted up details for that event. That's a
- 28:56Speaker 3: great event. If you know any middle or high school
- 28:58Speaker 3: students who might be considering pursuing a degree in science, engineering,
- 29:03Speaker 3: or technology, come check out all the vendors who will
- 29:06Speaker 3: be here that day. Their vendors not trying to sell
- 29:08Speaker 3: you something. They're actually vendors who are manufacturers, trying to
- 29:11Speaker 3: give you information about how to pursue degrees in science
- 29:15Speaker 3: and technology to work in the great paying fields that
- 29:18Speaker 3: those degrees represent. So once again, check out the website
- 29:22Speaker 3: www dot CCSSC dot org.
- 29:25Speaker 5: Sean and I thank you for listening, and we'll do
- 29:27Speaker 5: this again next weeks. Overhead Door Company of Columbus has
- 29:37Speaker 5: all of your garage door needs covered. Residential and commercial
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