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Your Questions Answered: The Mysteries of Jupiter and the Sun · Space Nuts: Astronomy Insights & Cosmic Discoveries

0:00
Andrew Dunkley: Hello again and thank you for joining us.
0:02
This is a Q and A edition of Space Nuts. Uh,
0:05
my name is Andrew Dunkley. Uh, this is
0:07
the episode where we answer questions from
0:10
our audience and sometimes our studio
0:13
audience. We've had, uh, people asking us
0:15
questions live in recent times. Uh,
0:17
coming up today, uh, we have actually
0:20
received an email from a listener,
0:23
um, Thomas in Canberra, asking about
0:26
Mitsubishi Heavy Industries and their
0:28
involvement at Siding Spring. I know someone
0:30
who might know something about.
0:32
Generic: About that.
0:34
Andrew Dunkley: Anyway, we'll talk about that. Um, we've got
0:36
a young listener who's sent in a question,
0:40
uh, about the storm on Jupiter.
0:43
Uh, we've also got a question about a mission
0:45
to the sun and,
0:47
uh, the speed of gravitational waves. We'll
0:50
try and tackle all of that on this Q A
0:52
edition of space nuts.
0:54
Generic: 15 seconds. Guidance is internal.
0:56
10, 9. Ignition
0:59
sequence start.
1:00
Professor Fred Watson: Space nuts.
1:01
Generic: 5, 4, 3, 2. 1, 2, 3, 4,
1:04
5, 5, 4, 3, 2, 1.
1:06
Andrew Dunkley: Space nuts.
1:07
Generic: Astronauts report it feels good.
1:10
Andrew Dunkley: And he's back again to solve all of those
1:12
riddles. Professor Fred Watson Watson,
1:14
Astronomer at large. Hello, Fred Watson.
1:15
Professor Fred Watson: Hello, Andrew.
1:16
Hello. Good to see you.
1:17
Andrew Dunkley: Good to see you.
1:18
Professor Fred Watson: Can I see you? Yes, I can see you.
1:20
Andrew Dunkley: You can see me?
1:20
Professor Fred Watson: Yeah, good to see you.
1:23
Andrew Dunkley: I've got a bit of a box head at your end of
1:25
things.
1:26
Professor Fred Watson: You. You squashed him. But, um, you're
1:29
looking nonetheless handsome for that. It's
1:31
all right.
1:32
Trent from North Georgia USA: Yeah.
1:33
Andrew Dunkley: My wife wouldn't agree, but anyway, she
1:35
might.
1:36
Trent from North Georgia USA: Different.
1:36
Andrew Dunkley: There's a different storey.
1:37
Professor Fred Watson: Yes.
1:39
Andrew Dunkley: Uh, shall we tackle some questions?
1:41
Professor Fred Watson: Why not?
1:42
Andrew Dunkley: All right.
1:43
Our first one comes from Thomas in Canberra.
1:46
I was down in Canberra a couple of weeks ago,
1:47
uh, and it was bitterly cold
1:50
as always. Some years ago we visited
1:53
Australia's very own Acropolis, um,
1:55
um, Pantheon and the Temple of Fred Watson I.
1:58
E. Siding Spring Observatory. Luckily for us,
2:01
it was an open day, so we got got to
2:04
tour inside the telescope hall. Uh, the
2:07
guide pointed out that we were standing on a
2:09
trapdoor several storeys up. Suffice to say
2:12
we all stepped aside onto solid flooring. I
2:15
noticed a plaque on the telescope hardware
2:17
that read Mitsubishi Heavy Industries. My
2:20
question is, what role does Mitsubishi play
2:23
in manufacturing modern telescope hardware,
2:26
if any? And is the telescope mirror made
2:28
in Ohio and polished in England,
2:32
still, uh, one of the best? Um, or he's
2:35
asking if it's still one of the best. So. Ah,
2:37
that's a good question. So, yeah, plenty to
2:40
ply through on that, Fred Watson. Uh, I've
2:42
been exactly there with you, doing a
2:45
television show, I believe. It was at one
2:48
stage many moons ago, but, uh, they kicked me
2:51
out because I had a head for radio. But,
2:53
um. Yeah, it's a good question. Uh, and
2:56
very observant of Thomas to pick up on all of
2:59
that. Except for the trapdoor. He missed
3:01
that.
3:02
Professor Fred Watson: Um, yeah, the trapdoor's
3:05
quite important because that's what lets you,
3:07
um, hoist things from the ground floor, which
3:10
is, uh, eight storeys below,
3:13
up seven storeys below, uh, up into the dome
3:16
area. And there's an intermediate level,
3:18
which is where we recoat the mirror every
3:21
year. And I'm saying we because it
3:24
used to be we when I was the astronomer in
3:26
charge and worked, uh, there for many, many
3:29
years. Uh, it's now other people, but, um, I
3:32
hope they won't mind, um, including
3:35
myself as part of their team, because I know
3:37
them all pretty well. Um, so, uh, that
3:40
trapdoor, uh, actually I do remember,
3:43
um, hearing a storey. I didn't see this
3:46
happen myself, but the trapdoor itself weighs
3:48
probably about three tonnes. Uh, and it's on
3:51
a hinge and it's got a kind of crane
3:53
mechanism to lift it up. And I do remember
3:55
somebody once telling me that it accidentally
3:57
got let go and it slammed shut and the
4:00
entire building shook, as you'd
4:03
expect. Yeah, that, uh, wasn't in my time
4:05
there, though, so, um. Indeed, the
4:08
Anglo Australian Telescope, a joint project
4:11
between the two governments, the Australian
4:13
government and the British government. Um,
4:15
really interesting storey, uh, how it
4:18
all started and, uh, how it emerged.
4:21
Um, it, uh, was uh,
4:24
the. Basically the first thing that happened
4:27
when, when they, you know, when the
4:29
governments decided to spend the money on
4:31
this. And it was, I think, 16 million was
4:33
what they had at the time. That would be more
4:36
like 100 million now to the same thing.
4:38
Um, but back in the late, uh,
4:41
1960s, actually, uh, they set up a
4:44
project office and the project office looked
4:46
at all the contractors and all the rest of
4:47
it. And so, um, that,
4:51
uh, office, which for a while
4:53
was run by a very old friend of mine, Herman
4:56
Wehner, um, who was in Canberra. He was
4:59
an engineer, uh, in Canberra.
5:01
Uh, so he would have been, I think, party
5:04
to some of these decisions, along with
5:06
another old friend, Ben Gascoigne, one of the
5:08
great names in Australian astronomy.
5:11
Um, and they elected to,
5:14
uh, accept a bid from Mitsubishi
5:17
Heavy Industries to build the mounting of the
5:20
telescope. And by that I mean the part that
5:22
actually points the thing around
5:25
and this is, it is heavy engineering, because
5:28
if I remember rightly, the moving parts of
5:30
the telescope are about 60 tonnes or
5:31
thereabouts, and yet you've got to point it
5:34
with an accuracy of a second of
5:37
arc, uh, which, you know, when you think of
5:39
the number of microns, that means in terms of
5:42
where the telescope structure is pointing,
5:44
that's quite significant. Uh, the telescope
5:46
floats on oil bearings. It actually floats on
5:49
oil. Um, and so all of that
5:52
has to come together and a company like
5:54
Mitsubishi uh, were very, very well
5:56
placed to deliver that.
5:59
Now, uh, um, uh,
6:02
Thomas's question is to an extent Mitsubishi
6:05
M is still involved with this sort of thing.
6:07
Uh, I think they would um, with
6:10
having that expertise, I think they would um,
6:13
sort of tender for contracts uh, whenever
6:16
there was an opportunity. Now, um,
6:18
if I'd had a bit more time and forethought
6:20
and I could still cheque it. But um, the
6:23
biggest telescope operated
6:26
by Japanese astronomers is called
6:28
Subaru. Uh, and
6:30
Subaru is of course the Japanese word for the
6:33
Pleiades. That's why you've got six stars on
6:35
your Subaru car badge. Subaru, uh,
6:39
is on the big island of Hawaii. It's an 8
6:41
metre class telescope. It is one of the
6:43
finest 8 metre telescopes in the world. I'm
6:46
not sure whether Mitsubishi played
6:49
a part in building
6:51
Subaru but that might be the kind of thing
6:53
that you might be able to tell me within a
6:56
few minutes with Claude whispering into your
6:58
ear or something. Were
7:01
Mitsubishi involved with Subaru.
7:03
Um, uh, the other side of the storey though
7:06
is what we call the tube of the telescope
7:08
which isn't a tube, it's an open structure
7:11
for anybody standing in front of it. It's the
7:14
white part, um, which contains all
7:17
the optics that was built by the company
7:20
I started my career working for. Sir Howard
7:22
Grubb Parsons Co. Ltd. They indeed
7:25
polished the mirrors. My uh,
7:28
old friend and colleague David Sindon
7:31
was the chief optician for that.
7:34
I am privileged to have in this
7:37
room his notebook, uh, that
7:40
he had all the notes when he was doing that
7:42
polishing and one of the first things it
7:45
says in the notebook, uh, when the mirror
7:48
blank was delivered indeed from Ohio, as
7:51
Thomas uh, said, um, uh, it was
7:54
then a 20 tonne block of material,
7:57
uh 4 metres in diameter. There's a comment in
8:00
the notebook that says this thing is bloody
8:03
big. Um, that's
8:06
David Sinden. So he was the optician. It made
8:08
a fantastic job working with his colleague
8:10
David Brown, my first boss, David Brown
8:13
and I worked a little bit on the mirror, um,
8:16
actually preparing the um,
8:18
hardware for the mirror to be supported
8:21
while it was being ground and polished, uh,
8:23
in the works in Newcastle on Tyne in England.
8:26
I did that just Before I left, uh, Grub
8:29
Parsons to go back to university to further
8:31
my career in astronomy.
8:34
Andrew Dunkley: Did you know at the time, or you wouldn't
8:36
have probably known at the time you were
8:37
working on it in the UK that you'd end up
8:39
using it?
8:41
Professor Fred Watson: Um, no, that's right. Not only did
8:44
I end up using it, I ended up as its
8:46
astronomer in charge, which I was for 20
8:48
years. Um,
8:53
it's a really good question. Um, thinking
8:56
back to that time, I was a bit
8:59
fixated on getting back to university because
9:01
I wasn't happy with my degree and I wanted to
9:03
do a research degree in astronomy, which I
9:06
did. That's another storey. Um,
9:09
and so I, um. You know, this, making these
9:12
supports for the telescope mirror was, uh,
9:15
something that I was quite keen to get out of
9:17
the way and I probably just never gave it a
9:20
thought that maybe one day I would use this
9:21
telescope. Certainly would never have given
9:23
it a thought that one day I'd be responsible
9:26
for its scientific output, which I was for 20
9:28
years.
9:29
Trent from North Georgia USA: Yeah.
9:29
Andrew Dunkley: And in answer to your query, the Subaru
9:32
telescope in Hawaii was
9:34
manufactured by Mitsubishi
9:37
Electric company.
9:39
Professor Fred Watson: There you go. Yeah, yeah, that was a, that
9:41
was a guess, but, um, uh, obviously a
9:44
reasonably informed guess.
9:46
Andrew Dunkley: Yeah, indeed. Thanks, uh, for the question,
9:49
Thomas, but, uh, yeah, um, it's an amazing
9:52
facility and I, I, uh, up at
9:54
Siding Spring. And I don't think people
9:56
realise how massive that building
9:59
is.
9:59
Professor Fred Watson: Yeah.
10:00
Andrew Dunkley: Until I sort of get up the top of the
10:02
mountain and take a look. You can see it from
10:05
just about everywhere. Uh, you can still see
10:07
it quite clearly. Um, uh, in the
10:09
aftermath of those tragic fires so many years
10:11
ago.
10:13
Um, but, uh, yeah, it's sort of
10:15
like a big pimple on the top of a hill.
10:18
It is, it's amazing. Thanks,
10:21
Thomas. Uh, we've got a few live viewers,
10:23
Fred Watson. We've got uh, Ollie in Geelong.
10:26
G' day, Ollie. Danny, uh, says he's added
10:28
Outback Astronomer to his, uh, audible wish
10:31
list. Uh, we've got Turk listening from
10:33
Sunnyvale in California and he's 35
10:36
miles from the Lick Observatory. You can see
10:38
it from his bedroom. Um, and uh, Moose
10:41
is back again. He's found us again. Hi,
10:43
Moose. You've, you've missed pretty much half
10:46
the whole deal today, but we're on a bit
10:49
earlier and uh, Tommy has
10:51
messaged us, um, uh, in the evening
10:54
in Frederikstad in Norway.
10:57
So welcome everybody.
11:00
Uh, let's go to an audio question.
11:02
Fred Watson, this is Sandy, but
11:04
it's not Sandy's question.
11:08
This will become self obvious.
11:09
Sandy from Melbourne: G' Day Fred Watson and Andrew. It's Sandy
11:11
here again from Melbourne. Um, this time my
11:14
little listening buddy, um, Emily, my
11:16
daughter would like to ask a question. Um,
11:19
she, she quite enjoys listening in the car,
11:22
um, to your show with me. So I'm going to
11:24
hand the, the microphone over to my daughter.
11:27
Why does Jupiter have a storm on it?
11:31
Excellent question. Thank you. Um, thank you
11:33
friend Andrew. I hope you get a chance to
11:35
answer this question and we're looking
11:37
forward to the answer.
11:39
Andrew Dunkley: Thank you, Sandy. Thank you, Emily. Hi Emily.
11:42
Um, that's a great question and
11:45
we've talked about the storm on Jupiter uh
11:48
many times in the past and in fact I think
11:50
there's more than one storm on Jupiter. But
11:53
there's one big one that
11:55
um, that's famously known as the Red
11:58
Spot.
12:00
Professor Fred Watson: It is in fact because it's big,
12:03
it's called the Great Red Spot. Um,
12:06
and um, I think there's another one sometimes
12:09
called Little Red as well,
12:11
Andrew Dunkley: which is uh, not far away
12:13
from the big one.
12:15
Professor Fred Watson: Yeah, um, Emily, your question's a great
12:17
one. Uh, and so in
12:20
the last episode we were talking about some
12:23
of the patterns that we get in the cloud
12:26
belts of Saturn. This
12:29
hexagon pattern and the decagon pattern.
12:32
And they are caused by um, the
12:35
way atmospheres behave. So this is
12:38
movements of air. Basically it's not air like
12:40
we breathe here on Earth, but it's wind,
12:44
uh, that give rise to these various patterns.
12:46
And the same thing happens on Jupiter.
12:48
Jupiter's got um, what we call the cloud
12:51
belt. So a, uh, lot of um, you
12:54
know, I don't know how many there are
12:56
altogether, how many are recognised. It used
12:57
to be eight or nine when I was a youngster.
13:00
Uh, these are different belts of cloud on the
13:02
planet, all of which are moving east to west
13:05
or west to east but at ah, different
13:08
speeds. And it's
13:11
those um, winds, if you like,
13:14
these mass movements of
13:17
atmospheric gas that cause
13:19
what we call turbulence on the edge. It's
13:22
where you find um,
13:26
um, air swirling around in a circle.
13:29
Um, many of us know about turbulence if we
13:32
fly on aeroplanes because you run into it
13:35
and it shakes the aircraft. And what you're
13:37
talking about there is the same sort of
13:39
thing. It's swirls of air that are not
13:42
behaving in a nice smooth, uh, manner.
13:44
And so uh, that's what happens at the
13:47
boundaries of these cloud belts. And uh,
13:50
sometime in the past, and it's
13:52
certainly more than 300 years ago, uh, that
13:55
was enough to form a storm,
13:58
uh, between two of these cloud belts, uh and
14:01
we still see that as the Great Red Spot. Uh,
14:04
you might know Emily, and maybe Sandy
14:07
will too. Your dad, um, that
14:10
uh, the Great Red Spot seems to be changing.
14:12
It's sort of grown and shrunk a bit a few
14:14
times recently. So it's
14:17
like uh, because this is, you know,
14:21
when we look at Jupiter we're seeing the top
14:23
of the cloud belts. We're not seeing a
14:24
surface that doesn't change. We're seeing
14:26
something that's very dynamic and active,
14:29
always uh, in motion. And so maybe one day
14:32
the Great Red Spot will just fizzle out and
14:35
we won't have that beauty spot on the
14:38
face of Jupiter anymore.
14:39
Andrew Dunkley: No, uh, when you talk about
14:42
storms on Earth, they come and go in minutes,
14:44
hours, sometimes occasionally days.
14:48
This one has been active for at least
14:50
190 years. It was uh, first
14:53
tracked in 1831 I think.
14:56
Professor Fred Watson: Yeah, it may have been spotted before that as
14:58
well. Some people think
15:00
um, possibly um, even ah, Cassini or
15:03
Huygens, one of these great observers of
15:05
Saturn might have seen it.
15:09
Andrew Dunkley: Maybe so, or he was just having a
15:11
migraine but
15:15
you just never know. But um, it's a
15:18
fascinating thing that uh, is displayed on
15:20
that planet. Uh, it's not the only gas giant
15:23
that has a storm like that. Does Saturn have
15:25
something similar?
15:26
Professor Fred Watson: Well Saturn does have storms but they
15:29
tend to be much more short lived. And that's
15:32
where young Trevor Barry that we were talking
15:34
about last episode, he monitored
15:37
those storms so that the Cassini mission
15:40
could home in on them uh, uh,
15:43
when they were at their most active.
15:44
Andrew Dunkley: So yeah, in fact it was Giovanni uh,
15:48
Cassini who suggested that there was a
15:50
permanent spot on Jupiter. And that was back
15:52
in 1665. There you go. Yeah, so yeah,
15:55
they've known about it for a long, it's been
15:56
around for a very long time Emily, this
15:59
particular storm.
16:01
Um, and uh, Fred Watson started his career
16:03
before the storm began
16:08
Professor Fred Watson: when it was just a wisp of wind.
16:13
Andrew Dunkley: Uh, thanks Emily, Lovely to hear from you.
16:15
This is Space Nuts Andrew Dunkley here with
16:17
Professor Fred Watson Watson.
16:21
Okay, we checked all four systems and
16:23
Professor Fred Watson: being with a girl, space nats.
16:25
Andrew Dunkley: Our next question, uh, comes from
16:29
Butch, I think. Yes. In Suffolk in the
16:32
uk. Hey Andrew, Professor Fred Watson,
16:33
possibly Jonty and Huw in the studio, not Huw
16:36
in the studio, I can tell you that now. Love
16:38
the show, uh, been with you for over two
16:41
years now. I went to a planetarium show in
16:44
Greenwich in the UK six years ago for my
16:46
46th birthday. Uh, this was hosted by
16:49
impressionist John Kulshaw. He was
16:52
amazing and One of the scientists with him
16:54
was working on the mission satellite to
16:57
the sun and explained how they can
17:00
film and track and circle the sun,
17:03
uh, and the heat involved.
17:05
Just wondering if you were aware of this
17:07
or had more information or opinions on it.
17:10
Quite an incredible mission really. There was
17:12
also a quiz after prizes were
17:15
astronaut food. I won nothing.
17:18
He says, uh, thanks for the excellent
17:20
podcast, love listening to you and uh, the
17:23
listener question. Thanks Butch. Uh, I
17:26
bought some astronaut food when I was in um,
17:29
NASA in Florida. Um,
17:32
it's not all that palatable
17:35
in my opinion. Probably
17:37
more designed for sustaining life than
17:41
enjoying food. Would that be, that'd be fair
17:43
remark?
17:44
Professor Fred Watson: Well, I think that's right. Although I
17:45
suspect things have moved on quite a bit. I
17:48
think, um, the International Space Station
17:51
has some, some quite nice gourmet meals
17:54
now. Seems to be, particularly when there are
17:56
Italian astronauts on board. They get great
17:58
coffee, you know.
18:00
Great, great.
18:01
Andrew Dunkley: Why am I not surprised? Yes. Um, because
18:04
they're gearing up for the restaurant at the
18:05
end of the universe probably.
18:07
Professor Fred Watson: Right? Yeah, yeah. Um, so
18:10
I'm, I'm guessing, uh, from what Butch
18:13
said that um, I mean there are, there are
18:16
several solar, ah, spacecraft
18:18
or spacecraft observing the sun.
18:21
Um, soho, the Solar Heliospheric
18:24
Observatory was one of the first. There's a
18:26
pair of spacecraft called stereo, uh, that
18:28
are in orbit around the sun
18:31
at uh, slightly different positions so they
18:33
get a stereo view of the sun. Um, I'm
18:36
wondering if the one that he's thinking of
18:37
though is the Parker solar probe.
18:39
And that's because that one of all
18:42
those uh, solar spacecraft is the one
18:45
that goes closest to the sun. And
18:48
indeed as that mission has evolved, I think
18:52
they've thrown caution to the
18:55
winds and got closer and closer to the sun.
18:58
It's got a very, very robust heat shield on
19:00
it, uh, which they point sunwards when
19:03
it's near the sun, uh, to protect the
19:06
spacecraft from the heat. Uh, its mission is
19:08
all about trying to sample the
19:11
solar corona, the outer atmosphere of the
19:14
sun, which as many of our listeners will
19:17
know, is heated to very, very high
19:20
temper, uh, in the region of
19:23
15 million degrees Celsius,
19:26
whereas that's right, the surface
19:28
is at about five, five and a half thousand
19:32
Celsius. And yet you've got this
19:34
region above, uh, and
19:37
we tend to think of heat rising by
19:39
convection. Uh, why is the surface so
19:42
cool compared with the heat of the
19:45
corona? And the clues that come from the
19:47
Parker solar probe and other spacecraft seem
19:49
to relate it directly to the magnetic
19:51
activity of the Sun. The sun is a hotbed of
19:54
magnetism, which is only really
19:57
becoming, uh, better understood. I might
20:00
just throw in a bit of advice though, for
20:03
Butch, because there's just lately, within
20:05
the last couple of weeks, we've seen some
20:08
extraordinary images of the solar, uh,
20:10
surface. It's not really a surface, it's
20:13
the gas region that we can see. It's called
20:16
the photosphere. They've come from the Daniel
20:18
K Inouye Solar Telescope, which is
20:21
on top of a mountain, uh, on the
20:24
island of Maui in Hawaii. It's, uh, the
20:26
summit of Haleakala. And that's the biggest
20:29
telescope, uh, in the world, able, uh,
20:32
to look at the sun and the images. The detail
20:34
that's coming back is quite
20:37
extraordinary.
20:38
Um, and what,
20:41
uh, has come from these latest images, and
20:44
this is a little bit off the track, but it's
20:46
interesting, uh, something that's fascinated
20:48
me for a long time. Things called, uh,
20:50
Kelvin. Hello. Well, let me get it
20:53
out. Kelvin Helmholtz instabilities,
20:56
if you want to look that up. Uh,
20:59
they're a little bit like what we were
21:01
talking about with Emily's question, where
21:03
you've got two masses of
21:06
atmosphere shearing against one another,
21:08
they're moving at different speeds and you,
21:11
uh, sometimes get these regular patterns
21:14
which are called Calvin Helmholtz
21:16
instabilities. They're quite striking. Um,
21:20
we saw some in Japan last year which, uh,
21:23
I took a photograph of. Um, this was with
21:25
clouds because clouds kind of reveal where
21:28
they're taking place. But these have now been
21:30
seen in the atmosphere of the sun.
21:32
Uh, people have thought they would find them,
21:34
but, yes, they have now been revealed.
21:36
Andrew Dunkley: Wow, that's exciting, isn't it?
21:38
Professor Fred Watson: Yeah.
21:39
Andrew Dunkley: Um, and you mentioned the Parker solar
21:42
probe, which may well be the mission that
21:44
Butcher, uh, is referring to. But, um,
21:47
it's become famous because of,
21:49
uh, the speed, speeds that it's achieved.
21:52
Professor Fred Watson: Yeah, that's right.
21:53
Andrew Dunkley: In fact, it's the fastest object
21:56
ever made by human beings. It, uh,
21:59
reached a top speed on 24 December 2024, of
22:01
692,000
22:05
kilometres per hour. That's 430,000
22:07
miles an hour, skimming about 3.8
22:10
million miles above the solar surface.
22:13
That's extraordinary.
22:15
Extraordinary. Fastest object ever are
22:18
made by humans. Uh, although
22:21
you turn a torch on and you're making light,
22:23
I think that should count. We've all achieved
22:26
light speed. Um, but,
22:29
yeah, uh, that's pretty impressive stuff.
22:31
And while we're talking about missions to the
22:33
sun, um, they've got a few coming up.
22:36
Uh, the sun coronal Ejection Tracker,
22:40
uh, which is supposedly
22:43
about to happen. Designed to track coronal
22:46
mass ejections and improve space weather
22:48
forecasting. There's the Multi slit
22:50
Solar Explorer which is due to launch in
22:53
2027. That's a NASA uh, mission
22:56
targeting fine detail of the solar
22:58
atmosphere. Um, I
23:01
don't know how to pronounce this. TSIS 2, uh,
23:04
is set to launch in 2027. And
23:08
um, they'll measure spectral
23:10
solar energy input into Earth's atmosphere.
23:14
And this one uh, is
23:17
already up there was uh, 2025, the
23:19
Interstellar Mapping and Acceleration Probe
23:21
IMAP, um, which uh,
23:24
is looking at the boundary where the
23:25
heliosphere meets interstellar space. So
23:28
uh, lots and lots of work going on around the
23:31
sun and I uh, don't think they'll stop there.
23:34
They'll keep going back to figure out more
23:36
about it. Um, I mean it's the easiest star
23:39
for us to study really.
23:41
Um, it's just
23:44
over there all the time. It's shining very
23:46
brightly today. I'm actually going to go
23:48
outside later because we're at the beginning
23:50
of the pollen season and see if I can
23:53
get myself another um, photo of the
23:56
um, pollen, pollen, pollen corona,
23:58
pollen corona.
23:59
Professor Fred Watson: Which, that would be great. Yeah, yeah.
24:02
Andrew Dunkley: I took one many years ago but I haven't been
24:04
able to get one uh, since. So I must have got
24:07
lucky that day. But I think
24:09
those photos work out better with an iPhone
24:12
than they do a ah, camera, uh, or
24:15
a telescope for that matter. But um, yeah,
24:17
anyway, I'll give it a go later. Thanks uh,
24:19
Butch, for your question.
24:23
The crew of Artemis 2 now bound for the moon.
24:26
Professor Fred Watson: Humanity's next great voyage begins.
24:29
Andrew Dunkley: Space Nuts. Our final question, an
24:32
audio uh, question comes from
24:35
somebody else who I've lost. I've found him
24:38
again. It's Trent.
24:40
Trent from North Georgia USA: Hello Andrew and Dr. Fred Watson.
24:42
This is Trent from North Georgia
24:45
USA. I had a
24:48
question. I know that gravitational
24:50
waves move at the universal
24:53
speed limit, the same as light in a
24:56
vacuum, but are
24:58
gravitational waves slowed down
25:02
as they pass through atmosphere and
25:04
planets?
25:05
You and water and things
25:08
like that, like light waves are
25:11
just curious. Love your show.
25:15
Been a long time listener and thoroughly
25:17
enjoy asking questions here. Y' all have a
25:20
wonderful day and I look forward to hearing
25:22
Matt.
25:23
Andrew Dunkley: Thank you Trent. Um, really good question.
25:25
Gravitational waves have been um,
25:28
a very popular topic of late. Uh, not
25:31
only with space nuts and listeners, but
25:33
scientists around the world trying to detect,
25:34
uh, them and figure them out and learn from
25:37
them because they can tell us about things
25:39
that have happened that we have not
25:40
witnessed. But uh, we know what they are and
25:43
why. Um, because
25:46
they vary according to, uh, the source.
25:50
Um, so, um, how fast do they
25:53
go and can something slow them down?
25:55
Fred Watson?
25:56
Professor Fred Watson: Yes, they go at the speed of light, exactly
25:58
as, uh, Trent says, but they don't slow
26:01
down. Oh, yeah. So they're not like
26:04
light. Um, they're not like photons of light,
26:07
which are, uh, subatomic particles that
26:10
interact with, you know, the electrons and
26:12
atoms, um, of, uh, of
26:15
a medium that they're pla. That they're
26:17
passing through, and that's what slows them
26:18
down. But gravitational waves are actually
26:22
in, well, we sometimes call it the fabric
26:25
of space time. They're basically. They're
26:28
waves in space. Um, and so,
26:31
um, matter, the kind of stuff that
26:34
I think Trent's thinking of, doesn't block
26:36
them, doesn't absorb them, doesn't impede
26:38
them, doesn't slow them down. They just go
26:40
right through it. Uh, uh, they go through
26:43
planets, stars,
26:46
humans, anything, as though they were
26:48
just empty space. So they
26:51
don't.
26:52
Andrew Dunkley: They don't.
26:53
Trent from North Georgia USA: All right.
26:53
Andrew Dunkley: That was easy. That was quick.
26:55
Professor Fred Watson: It was, wasn't it?
26:56
Andrew Dunkley: So I'm going to give you a question without
26:57
notice that's come from our live audience.
26:59
This comes from Tommy. He says artificial
27:02
intelligence, uh, is great for pattern
27:05
recognition. Any comments about the
27:07
advancements in computer science?
27:10
Professor Fred Watson: Um, certainly AI is used a lot in, um,
27:13
astrophysics, um, because
27:16
a lot of what we study in astronomy and
27:18
astrophysics relies on very
27:22
complex statistical methodologies.
27:25
Um, you know, Bayesian statistics and all
27:27
kinds of stuff that I never knew about when I
27:30
was a student. Uh, and AI
27:33
is great at dealing with that kind of thing
27:35
and teasing out some of the nuances
27:38
from, uh, you know, from the work that's
27:41
going on. So,
27:45
um, and that's just one example of the way
27:47
that perhaps AI is being used in astronomy
27:49
and astrophysics. Yes.
27:51
Andrew Dunkley: Yeah. Um, it's making inroads into
27:54
just about every facet of life and business,
27:57
isn't it, Fred Watson? Um, and
28:00
there's a lot of debate over whether or not
28:01
this is a good thing. I actually
28:04
read a report today, not, uh, that it's
28:07
suggesting AI is the problem, but, uh, it's
28:10
suggesting that screen time is the problem.
28:12
But, um, the, um,
28:15
academic decline in the
28:18
school students, um, that they're
28:21
witnessing now, the exam results,
28:24
uh, globally, uh, on standard
28:27
tests, is showing that, um,
28:30
there's a, you know, the curve is falling.
28:33
Um, we're seeing a decline in scholastic
28:36
ability. And they're blaming screen time,
28:38
they're blaming access to easy data
28:41
without using your brain to figure it out.
28:43
Um, it's, uh, something that
28:46
governments and institutions around the world
28:49
are going to have to tackle, if they haven't
28:51
started already. And I'm sure they have. But,
28:53
uh, yeah, ah, it's, it's a growing, it's a
28:54
growing problem. But, um, I don't think we're
28:57
going to stop, um, using AI and
28:59
computers and tablets and
29:02
smartphones anytime soon. So we've got
29:05
to find a way for everything to work together
29:08
in unison to the benefit of
29:11
humanity.
29:12
And, uh, um, maybe
29:15
doing what we've done in New South Wales and
29:17
banning phones in classrooms, uh, might be
29:20
a start.
29:20
Professor Fred Watson: Who knows?
29:22
Andrew Dunkley: Uh, thanks, Trent. Great question. Great to
29:24
hear from you.
29:24
Great to hear from everybody who contributed.
29:26
Thank you so much. And don't forget to send
29:28
your questions through to us on our website,
29:30
spacenutspodcast.com or
29:33
spacenuts IO. Click on the little AMA
29:36
link at the top. That means ask me anything.
29:38
And don't forget to tell us who you are or
29:40
where you're from, uh, in text or audio form.
29:42
And while you're there, have a look around,
29:44
visit our shop, sign up for the astronomy
29:46
newsletter and, um, yeah, whatever
29:49
you like. And please leave reviews wherever
29:51
you listen to us. Uh, and thank you,
29:54
Fred Watson, as always. It's been great fun.
29:56
Professor Fred Watson: It's been good, doesn't it? Yep. And we'll do
29:58
it again soon. We will.
29:59
Andrew Dunkley: Professor Fred Watson Watson, astronomer at
30:01
large, and thanks to Huw in the studio,
30:02
couldn't be with us today, did a mission to
30:04
the sun, forgot his sunscreen back in
30:07
hospital.
30:07
And from me, Andrew Dunkley. Thanks for your
30:09
company. We'll see you in the next episode of
30:12
Space Nuts. Until then, bye bye.
30:15
Uh, you'll be listening to the Space Nuts
30:18
podcast, available
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