Latest / Made of Stars / You Set My Soul Alight

Transcript

You Set My Soul Alight · Made of Stars

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  Speaker 1: Warning. The following podcast contains an entertaining look at astronomy, physics,
• 0:04
  Speaker 1: and space news throughout the known universe. Listeners have been
• 0:07
  Speaker 1: known to learn about astronomical phenomenon, the scientific method, and
• 0:10
  Speaker 1: expanded vocabulary to include terms like quasar asterism and uranus. Listen,
• 0:15
  Speaker 1: that's your own risk.
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  Speaker 2: Go ahead.
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  Speaker 3: When made of stars, made them stars mad sizes. When
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  Speaker 3: made of stars, you could be from high they would
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  Speaker 3: New Mexicomus, where all stars?
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  Speaker 4: When we are made of stars. I'm Wes Carol, joined
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  Speaker 4: by my good friend doctor Seawan Cruisin from i'm a
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  Speaker 4: State University's Coca Cola Space Signed Center Morning Sean.
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  Speaker 2: M morn Wes could to be here again today.
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  Speaker 4: We have a lot of black hole content today. I
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  Speaker 4: don't know how else to say it. Supermassive black holes,
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  Speaker 4: black holes. And then kind of a cool story a
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  Speaker 4: little bit later in the show, we'll talk about radio
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  Speaker 4: signals from deep space, possible reasons for that. I know
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  Speaker 4: some possible reasons for that. It's called aliens. But that
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  Speaker 4: may not be what we're going to talk about today necessarily.
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  Speaker 4: So let's start with a story about and this is
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  Speaker 4: from space dot Com about Stark's massive store explosions that
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  Speaker 4: could have had a significant impact on Earth in the past.
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  Speaker 2: Yeah, these are the kinds of giant exploding stars that
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  Speaker 2: can lead to garden variety black holes, not necessarily super
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  Speaker 2: massive black holes. But when you when you start parsing
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  Speaker 2: out like more normal black holes versus less normal black holes,
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  Speaker 2: it's already you're already dangerous territory because that black hole
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  Speaker 2: is a weird thing, whether it's garden variety or super massive,
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  Speaker 2: either one.
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  Speaker 4: And it's weird to even reference them as sort of
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  Speaker 4: a garden variety black hole, because I mean, what does
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  Speaker 4: that even mean? Right?
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  Speaker 2: Yeah, just what it means when you're talking to an astronomer,
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  Speaker 2: which is already an unusual event right there, right right,
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  Speaker 2: You've got to consider your life choices when you're, you know,
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  Speaker 2: at a party and you're chatting with an astrophysicist, like,
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  Speaker 2: how did I end up here? All right? Well, so
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  Speaker 2: what it is is this, by the way, story on
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  Speaker 2: space dot com. The question imposed is did massive star explosions,
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  Speaker 2: supernov explosions, did they trigger two mass extinctions that we
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  Speaker 2: find in the geological record on Earth? Could giant exploding
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  Speaker 2: stars that were near enough to the Earth have caused
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  Speaker 2: the circumstances necessary for most of the life on Earth
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  Speaker 2: to be wiped out. So that's where we're going with
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  Speaker 2: the story. Again. It's on space dot Com and there's
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  Speaker 2: new research that says, why, yes, they could have if
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  Speaker 2: those supernova occurred within a certain distance a certain radius
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  Speaker 2: of the Earth, they could have actually stripped our planet's
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  Speaker 2: atmosphere of its protective ozone layer. So why is ozone important? Well,
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  Speaker 2: because that ozone layer. The reason we don't want holes
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  Speaker 2: in our ozone layer, by the way, is because that
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  Speaker 2: ozone layer protects us from deadly ultraviolet radiation from the sun.
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  Speaker 2: So if we have an ozone layer, it's a good thing.
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  Speaker 4: Got it?
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  Speaker 2: Ozone?
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  Speaker 4: Good check?
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  Speaker 2: Okay, Yes, ozone in the right place is good. Ozone
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  Speaker 2: coming out of your car's tailpipe not as good as
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  Speaker 2: it could be. Ozone at the top of the atmosphere
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  Speaker 2: definitely good because it acts as a UV shield, and
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  Speaker 2: without we already get enough ultraviolet radiation. Like if you
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  Speaker 2: go spend a long day at the beach and you
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  Speaker 2: forgot to put on your sunscreen, you're gonna find out
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  Speaker 2: that we get plenty of ultraviolet already. It's kind of
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  Speaker 2: the longer wavelength ultraviolet that mostly gets through. It's the
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  Speaker 2: less damaging but still damaging kind. And there's enough of
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  Speaker 2: that short ultra violet, short wavelength ultra violet that gets
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  Speaker 2: through as well. We always want to put something on
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  Speaker 2: our skin that's going to protect ourselves when we go
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  Speaker 2: out there. Okay, well, imagine the primary shield, which is
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  Speaker 2: the ozone layer, just wasn't even there at all. Now,
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  Speaker 2: instead of a sun burn, you would get a sun fry, yeah,
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  Speaker 2: which is not worth right. Yeah, yeah, that sounds bad,
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  Speaker 2: by the way.
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  Speaker 4: Just hearing the words ozone layer, it took me back,
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  Speaker 4: like I suddenly was, you know, like ten years old
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  Speaker 4: in school in like fourth or fifth grade, with my
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  Speaker 4: call to action to go home and throw away all
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  Speaker 4: the cans of aerosol hair spray. Like I feel like
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  Speaker 4: I'm a call to action that we were given back then.
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  Speaker 4: So I'm just I'm having a flashback. Man, I'm tripping.
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  Speaker 2: And it's a good thing you did that, because now
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  Speaker 2: we still have an ozone.
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  Speaker 4: Layer, that's right, we do, thankfully.
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  Speaker 2: And research is telling us that if we didn't have
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  Speaker 2: that ozone layer, it would be bad. We'd be fried.
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  Speaker 4: Yeah, So we have an understanding of the importance of
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  Speaker 4: that ozone layer.
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  Speaker 2: Yep, exactly, all right. So, so to get back to
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  Speaker 2: the subject, can a nearby supernova strip the planet's ozone layer?
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  Speaker 2: And in fact, not only can it, but has it
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  Speaker 2: done that in the past. Well, there's a new study
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  Speaker 2: that came out. One of the co authors of the
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  Speaker 2: study is Nick Wright, an astrophysicist professor at Keele University
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  Speaker 2: in England. Again story on space dot com. The quote
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  Speaker 2: from Nick Wright is this, a slightly more distant supernova
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  Speaker 2: could still cause considerable loss of life here on Earth.
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  Speaker 2: But at this distance, which he means about sixty light years,
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  Speaker 2: it would be terrifying. Now again these are the words
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  Speaker 2: of Nick Right, co author of the study. Why does
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  Speaker 2: he mean it would be terrifying, Well, because it could
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  Speaker 2: remove that ozone layer, and then the Earth would be
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  Speaker 2: unprotected from a large influx of short wavelength ultraviolet light
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  Speaker 2: from the Sun, thereby being able to damage or even
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  Speaker 2: destroy most of the life on the planet. Right, all right,
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  Speaker 2: So it turns out that that's not what this team
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  Speaker 2: set out to study. They were actually setting out to
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  Speaker 2: study what they call luminas stars. In other words, the
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  Speaker 2: biggest and brightest of the stars and what their distribution
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  Speaker 2: is around our galaxy and throughout the universe. And so
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  Speaker 2: they were looking at about twenty four thousand of these
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  Speaker 2: luminous stars from a survey called the Gaya survey. That's
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  Speaker 2: Guya the satellite, not a nickname for the Earth, all right,
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  Speaker 2: So Guya the satellite. And so they were looking in
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  Speaker 2: this sensus of stars for these ultra luminos stars, and
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  Speaker 2: what they found were all kinds of evidences of supernova
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  Speaker 2: explosions that took place, some of them in the near
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  Speaker 2: proximity to Earth, and some of them which corresponded in
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  Speaker 2: time with mass extinction events in the geological record here
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  Speaker 2: on the Earth. Which that's what's unusual, right, that's the
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  Speaker 2: interesting thing. So they didn't mean to set out down
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  Speaker 2: this road. It's just that happenstance and taking a careful
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  Speaker 2: look at the data forced them into this conclusion that hey,
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  Speaker 2: some of these big supernova explosions which we now see
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  Speaker 2: in this survey that took place, they took place in
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  Speaker 2: a way that the radiation wave would have arrived at
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  Speaker 2: the Earth corresponding to a couple of mass extinction events,
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  Speaker 2: which were they well, the first one was the Late
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  Speaker 2: Devonian period was a series of mass extinction events that
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  Speaker 2: occurred about three hundred and seventy two million years ago,
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  Speaker 2: And the other one was the Ordovisian mass extinction event,
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  Speaker 2: which is a terrible massive extinction event that took place
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  Speaker 2: four hundred and forty five million years ago and was
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  Speaker 2: what they called one of the first of the big
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  Speaker 2: five mass extinctions that we find in our geological record.
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  Speaker 2: During the Ordavsian event, approximately seventy five percent of all
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  Speaker 2: species on the Earth, particularly in the types of fish
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  Speaker 2: found in ancient seasoned lakes, were wiped out. So this
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  Speaker 2: is this is really a bad, you know, a bad
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  Speaker 2: event in Earth's history. There are all kinds of potential
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  Speaker 2: explanations with geological sources, like something that happened either environmentally
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  Speaker 2: or geologically here on the Earth. But now there's a
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  Speaker 2: possibility that it could have been a nearby supernova. So
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  Speaker 2: it turns out that this team of astronomers has actually
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  Speaker 2: fairly specific events that they have identified in their survey
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  Speaker 2: of nearby luminos stars that shows the very good correlation
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  Speaker 2: of a couple of nearby supernova with these two mass extinctions,
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  Speaker 2: and also shows from a theoretical standpoint that had these
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  Speaker 2: supernova taken place within that sixty light year radius, that
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  Speaker 2: they could have indeed removed the ozone layer. So now
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  Speaker 2: from this study, two pieces of evidence suggesting very strongly
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  Speaker 2: that perhaps a couple of the worst events wiping out
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  Speaker 2: life on Earth for a large portion of life on Earth,
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  Speaker 2: are correlated to nearby supernova explosions. Interesting story read about
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  Speaker 2: it on space dot com.
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  Speaker 4: Universe Today dot Com has a story about how actively
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  Speaker 4: feeding supermassive black holes could be good for life, which
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  Speaker 4: doesn't sound sounding. It makes sense when you consider the
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  Speaker 4: amount of radiation that's put out, So does that mean
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  Speaker 4: it could be good for life like an animal like
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  Speaker 4: the platypus That doesn't really have an explanation for it,
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  Speaker 4: just maybe some radiation coming from nearby.
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  Speaker 2: I think platypuses like supermassive black holes. Probably. This is
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  Speaker 2: just there's no science behind this whatsoever. It's just my
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  Speaker 2: personal opinion. But I've talked to a couple of them,
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  Speaker 2: and they seem to be fans, particularly of the song
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  Speaker 2: super massive black Hole.
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  Speaker 4: Nice you know. Yeah, So anyway, platopus and is it
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  Speaker 4: Parry in that cartoon anyway?
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  Speaker 2: Pry Harry the Platypus. Yea, yeah, I remember that guy.
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  Speaker 2: So there's that, all right, So all right, So we
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  Speaker 2: just talked about an event that can create what we
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  Speaker 2: referred to as a garden variety black hole, or in
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  Speaker 2: other words, a stellar mass black hole. Now we're talking
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  Speaker 2: about super massive black holes, which only seem to form
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  Speaker 2: at the centers of galaxies. So these super massive black
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  Speaker 2: holes can have the mass of over a million suns
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  Speaker 2: at times. And these are true monsters, and as we
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  Speaker 2: look back over time, we can find them far away
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  Speaker 2: from the Earth, which is also looking back in history
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  Speaker 2: during a time where these super massive black holes were well,
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  Speaker 2: they were eating. They were feeding because it was still
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  Speaker 2: enough material right around them that there was plenty of
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  Speaker 2: material for them to feed on. And so as they
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  Speaker 2: drew that material in, they also belched out a very
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  Speaker 2: copious amount of deadly radiation. During this era of time,
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  Speaker 2: when a super massive black hole is feeding, we have
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  Speaker 2: a nickname for that. We call them active galactic nuclei.
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  Speaker 2: It's actually more than a nickname, it's an astrophysical designation,
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  Speaker 2: So AGNs. Active galactic nuclei are what astronomers refer to
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  Speaker 2: as super massive black holes. Eating up all the neighborhood
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  Speaker 2: around them and then belching out large amounts of radioactive materials.
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  Speaker 2: So there you go, all right, So that sounds bad,
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  Speaker 2: Like I'm in imagine if you were, imagine you were
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  Speaker 2: living on a planet that was around a star system
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  Speaker 2: that was very near the super massive black hole, which
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  Speaker 2: was both eating everything around it and belching out large
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  Speaker 2: amounts of radiation. That does not sound like a nice neighborhood.
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  Speaker 4: It doesn't sound good at all unless you're a platypus.
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  Speaker 2: Maybe, but you know, as far as I know, platypuses
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  Speaker 2: might be completely you know, immune to radiation effects. I
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  Speaker 2: don't think that's true.
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  Speaker 4: Yeah, I don't know. I mean I can't I've heard.
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  Speaker 2: I'm not going to do any experiments to find out.
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  Speaker 4: By the way, I mean, when you start growing duck
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  Speaker 4: bills in places there probably shouldn't be duck bills, I mean,
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  Speaker 4: I think they probably have benefited from it, That's all
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  Speaker 4: I'm saying.
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  Speaker 2: Could be that Australia was exposed to I don't know.
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  Speaker 4: I don't know platopus ologist is all I'm saying.
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  Speaker 2: And neither am I and you know, and and you know,
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  Speaker 2: God bless you if you chose that field by the
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  Speaker 2: way of research.
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  Speaker 4: Watched a lot of urb with my boys. But that's
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  Speaker 4: about the extent with Perry Perry. But that's that's all
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  Speaker 4: I got.
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  Speaker 2: So, so, whether or not platypuses could be more copious
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  Speaker 2: because of super massive black holes is actually the question. Yes,
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  Speaker 2: this article in Universe today dot com. You can check
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  Speaker 2: out this article on universitydy dot com. Could supermassive black
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  Speaker 2: holes actually be good for life? Beneficial to planets that
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  Speaker 2: might be forming life? Hmm, all right, interesting question, Let's
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  Speaker 2: go down the chain of logic. Researchers at Dartmouth College
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  Speaker 2: and the University of Exeter have simulated the effects of
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  Speaker 2: radiation from one of these active galactic nuclei on worlds
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  Speaker 2: that might have formed somewhat nearby to a supermassive black hole.
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  Speaker 2: And here's what they have found. They've found this, if
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  Speaker 2: life got a foothold before the most violent period of
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  Speaker 2: the active galactic nuclei taking place, before this active glactic
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  Speaker 2: nuclei had a chance to really radiate its surrounding neighborhood.
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  Speaker 2: If life got a foothold, that mean that that life
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  Speaker 2: could have produced oxygen in the atmosphere of this hypothetical
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  Speaker 2: alien world. And if that oxygen was already in the atmosphere,
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  Speaker 2: then when the bombardment of radiation, particularly ultraviolet radiation, came
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  Speaker 2: in from this active galactic nuclei, it could have actually
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  Speaker 2: generated ozone in the atmosphere of that alien planet. All Right, friends,
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  Speaker 2: let's remember why that's a good thing, because from the
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  Speaker 2: previous story, ozone is a layer of the atmosphere that
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  Speaker 2: protects us from ultraviolet. Wait a minute, the very ultraviolet
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  Speaker 2: that we need protection from could be generated by the
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  Speaker 2: ultraviolet itself if you have oxygen in the atmosphere. Yes,
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  Speaker 2: says Dartmouth College and University of Exeter researchers. And in fact,
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  Speaker 2: that radiation may have been provided by supermassive black holes
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  Speaker 2: in galaxies. All right. Kendall Sippy is the lead author
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  Speaker 2: of the study. Kendall has a quote says this, once
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  Speaker 2: life exists and has oxygenated to the atmosphere, the radiation
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  Speaker 2: becomes less devastating and possibly even a good thing. Once
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  Speaker 2: that bridge is crossed, the planet becomes more resilient to
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  Speaker 2: ultra violet radiation and protected from the potential extinction effects unquote.
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  Speaker 2: So what the what those planets needed? In the previous
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  Speaker 2: story like Earth was just more ozone. Wow, isn't that interesting?
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  Speaker 2: By the way, additional health effects for a planet that
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  Speaker 2: might be bombarded by UV radiation from a supermassive black hole.
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  Speaker 2: Thatse that UV radiation can also produce vitamin D in
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  Speaker 2: the atmosphere, and it could boost the complex molecules necessary
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  Speaker 2: to block the v from affecting the life. So high
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  Speaker 2: energy u V light reacts with oxygen in the atmosphere,
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  Speaker 2: apparently in a beneficial way that some planets might actually
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  Speaker 2: need in order to develop life in the first place.
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  Speaker 2: Great story. Check it out on Universe today dot com.
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  Speaker 4: Coming up after a quick break, What do you know?
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  Speaker 4: Another supermassive black hole story. We'll talk about that next.
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  Speaker 4: All right, So we've talked about the bad stuff and
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  Speaker 4: then with the concerning black holes and supernovas and things,
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  Speaker 4: and then we've talked about the good positive stuff with
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  Speaker 4: potential positive stuff. When it comes to supermassive black holes,
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  Speaker 4: let's talk about one that's too far away one of
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  Speaker 4: our nearby neighbors.
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  Speaker 2: Could there be a super massive black hole right in
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  Speaker 2: our own neighborhood? Well, wait a minute, we already know
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  Speaker 2: there is one in the center of our own milky Way.
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  Speaker 2: But before I tell you the story, friends, I want
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  Speaker 2: to just take a pause for a moment, and I
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  Speaker 2: think you should just in another window on your computer
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  Speaker 2: as you're listening to this podcast, pull up the band
• 17:24
  Speaker 2: Muse and the song super Massive Black Hole and just
• 17:27
  Speaker 2: kind of have it playing in the background. We would
• 17:28
  Speaker 2: have done that for you on the radio, you know,
• 17:31
  Speaker 2: years ago, when Wes and I were doing a radio show.
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  Speaker 2: But that's when we had you know, rights and licensing
• 17:35
  Speaker 2: and there's it's sticky points, right, So because we can't
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  Speaker 2: do it ourselves, we're gonna just recommend that you do it.
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  Speaker 2: Just have it playing softly, super Massive black Hole in
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  Speaker 2: the background through the remainder of this podcast. That's what
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  Speaker 2: I want.
• 17:47
  Speaker 4: We're immediately following, you know, you finish and just fire
• 17:50
  Speaker 4: it up, and that'd be a good way to close
• 17:52
  Speaker 4: us out, you know.
• 17:53
  Speaker 2: It's it's a good way to just bring your mind
• 17:55
  Speaker 2: in the right state to think about this story.
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  Speaker 4: Yeah, especially if you're you're listening on Spotify. It would
• 18:01
  Speaker 4: be an easy transition over to listen to music that's easy.
• 18:05
  Speaker 2: I'm pretty sure Muse would appreciate it. Yeah, I'm pretty sure,
• 18:08
  Speaker 2: it's going to put you in the right frame of
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  Speaker 2: mind for this story.
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  Speaker 4: Yeah, all right.
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  Speaker 2: The black hole that's super massive that lives at the
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  Speaker 2: center of the Milky Way has a nickname or a
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  Speaker 2: name or an astronomical designation. It's called Sagittarius A. And
• 18:25
  Speaker 2: the reason it's called Sagittarius A is because when you
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  Speaker 2: go out and look at the nighttime sky in the
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  Speaker 2: direction of the constellation Sagittarius, you're looking in the direction
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  Speaker 2: toward the center of our own Milky Way. You may
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  Speaker 2: not realize it, but that's where that's where the middle
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  Speaker 2: of the pinwheel is, and in the middle of the
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  Speaker 2: pinwheel is a super massive black hole. When radio astronomers
• 18:46
  Speaker 2: first realize, golly, there are radio signals coming from objects
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  Speaker 2: in space, they began to map out all of these
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  Speaker 2: radio signals. And the very first one, because it was
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  Speaker 2: the most energy I had a source in the constellation
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  Speaker 2: of Sagittarius, they called it A. The second one they
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  Speaker 2: called B. You see how this is going to go.
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  Speaker 2: It's cataloging, right. Sagittarius A was so strong and easy
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  Speaker 2: to detect because it's the super massive black hole at
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  Speaker 2: the center of the Milky Way. Before we even knew
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  Speaker 2: there were super massive black holes at the centers of galaxies. Wow,
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  Speaker 2: cool stuff, all right, So that super massive black hole
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  Speaker 2: is actually, you know, it's pretty far away because it's
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  Speaker 2: fifty thousand light years from the center of the galaxy
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  Speaker 2: out to the edge. Right then we're about two thirds
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  Speaker 2: of the way out, so it's now that's thirty k
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  Speaker 2: you know, thirty thousand light years all right. So so
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  Speaker 2: there's another nearby galaxy that is it's kind of a
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  Speaker 2: little train wreck. It's not very big, it doesn't have
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  Speaker 2: any really super defined structure. We call it in a
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  Speaker 2: regular galaxy, and we nicknamed it after that guy Magellan
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  Speaker 2: because he was the first euro guy in a ship
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  Speaker 2: to look at this guy and go, what's that faint
• 20:06
  Speaker 2: fuzzy thing? All right, So it's called the Large Magellanic Cloud,
• 20:11
  Speaker 2: the LMC. Just know that it is a dwarf irregular
• 20:16
  Speaker 2: galaxy that's basically in orbit about the Milky Way and
• 20:20
  Speaker 2: can have gravitational interactions with the Milky Way itself. All right.
• 20:24
  Speaker 2: So there's a group of astronomers from the Harvard Smithsonian
• 20:27
  Speaker 2: Center for Astrophysics that has recognized an effect that seems
• 20:34
  Speaker 2: to be coming from the large Magellanic Cloud on a
• 20:37
  Speaker 2: group of galaxies in our own Milky Way. Something has
• 20:42
  Speaker 2: given these stars in the Milky Way a powerful kick,
• 20:47
  Speaker 2: a giant acceleration, And now these stars seem to be
• 20:51
  Speaker 2: moving with what astronomers call hypervelocity. They're moving with speeds
• 20:58
  Speaker 2: up to two point two million miles per hour relative
• 21:02
  Speaker 2: to all the other stars around them, which means what happened,
• 21:07
  Speaker 2: what gave these stars a giant shove? Well, the group
• 21:14
  Speaker 2: from CFA Harvard Smithsonian Center for Astrophysics, when examining the
• 21:18
  Speaker 2: data from again the Guy A telescope and a story
• 21:21
  Speaker 2: about Guy earlier, so they were able to track these
• 21:26
  Speaker 2: stars back to an effect point from a certain location,
• 21:31
  Speaker 2: and that was a near encounter with the large Magelantic Cloud. Now,
• 21:36
  Speaker 2: the cloud itself doesn't have enough concentrated mass to really
• 21:40
  Speaker 2: generate these kinds of accelerations in stars in the Milky Way.
• 21:43
  Speaker 2: But if that little tiny galaxy happened to be harboring
• 21:47
  Speaker 2: a super massive black hole, the super massive black hole
• 21:52
  Speaker 2: could have given these stars hypervelocity. And looks like that's
• 21:56
  Speaker 2: exactly what did happen. And in fact, these dramas from
• 22:00
  Speaker 2: CFA were actually able to even use the accelerations of
• 22:03
  Speaker 2: these stars to project a possible mass for the black
• 22:06
  Speaker 2: hole in the LMC of six hundred thousand solar masses.
• 22:11
  Speaker 2: So this is a pretty good sized black hole. Now,
• 22:15
  Speaker 2: there have been other pieces of evidence for a potential
• 22:19
  Speaker 2: supermassive black hole in the Large Magelanic Cloud, but this
• 22:23
  Speaker 2: seems to be the most solid piece of evidence to
• 22:27
  Speaker 2: date suggesting that there's a supermassive black hole in the LMC.
• 22:33
  Speaker 2: One of the important points, and it's just important to
• 22:35
  Speaker 2: point out, is kind of just a context for the story,
• 22:38
  Speaker 2: which is typically we expect supermassive black holes to be
• 22:43
  Speaker 2: found in the center of large galaxies and particularly spiral
• 22:47
  Speaker 2: galaxies like the Milky Way. It is far less common
• 22:52
  Speaker 2: for us to find evidence of a supermassive black hole
• 22:55
  Speaker 2: in a small, irregular dwarf galaxy like the Large Magelantic Cloud,
• 23:00
  Speaker 2: which again that's what makes the story unusual. Check out
• 23:03
  Speaker 2: the story on astronomy dot com. Friends great story about
• 23:08
  Speaker 2: possible big black hole in the l MC.
• 23:11
  Speaker 4: More made of stars right after this. I tease this
• 23:35
  Speaker 4: story at the beginning, and this is as Astronomer's a
• 23:40
  Speaker 4: new perspective on possibly where a radio signal could be
• 23:44
  Speaker 4: coming from a repeating signal, and I'm a little disappointed
• 23:47
  Speaker 4: because they're not already suiting up Jodie Foster.
• 23:52
  Speaker 2: So so Wes Kids. But but really, there have been many,
• 23:58
  Speaker 2: many times in the hist of radio astronomy where the
• 24:03
  Speaker 2: astronomers hearing these signals basically didn't have a ready explanation
• 24:09
  Speaker 2: for what they were detecting at hand other than aliens.
• 24:12
  Speaker 2: And so there have been many times where very serious
• 24:17
  Speaker 2: and legitimate astronomers have said, I don't know what this
• 24:20
  Speaker 2: could be except, you know, little green men. And there
• 24:24
  Speaker 2: have actually been handwritten notes next to radio signal data
• 24:29
  Speaker 2: with the term LGM written next to it, which stands
• 24:33
  Speaker 2: for little Green Men, because they just didn't have a ready,
• 24:37
  Speaker 2: readily available physical explanation for what they're seeing. We still
• 24:43
  Speaker 2: know this is a bit true if you listen to
• 24:45
  Speaker 2: the show regularly. We like ferbies. We still know this
• 24:48
  Speaker 2: is a bit true for fast radio bursts, which are
• 24:50
  Speaker 2: shortcuted as a ferbie.
• 24:54
  Speaker 4: And I mean, if you're someone who wants to believe
• 24:59
  Speaker 4: right to go to go to the X Files, or
• 25:01
  Speaker 4: you know, you go to the movie Contact, which I
• 25:04
  Speaker 4: was referencing about Jodie Foster. I mean it's easy to
• 25:08
  Speaker 4: kind of let the science fiction side of it roll in,
• 25:10
  Speaker 4: but astronomers actually have a better I mean not as
• 25:15
  Speaker 4: much fun, but a better explanation.
• 25:18
  Speaker 2: Well, in recent episodes, go back a couple episodes, we've
• 25:21
  Speaker 2: talked about some more modern explanation for fast radio bursts.
• 25:26
  Speaker 2: But the object we're going to talk about right now
• 25:28
  Speaker 2: is a slow radio burst.
• 25:31
  Speaker 4: Well, and tell me, let me just say this too.
• 25:33
  Speaker 4: Also to the defense of the people who want it
• 25:35
  Speaker 4: to be something else, is I mean, we've sent radio
• 25:39
  Speaker 4: signals into space from Earth, right, so I mean you
• 25:43
  Speaker 4: could see where if it seems like a way to
• 25:46
  Speaker 4: actually communicate send some sort of message. Anyway, just last.
• 25:50
  Speaker 2: Streamest, we were discussing that one of the most profound
• 25:54
  Speaker 2: questions to humanity is whether or not we're alone in
• 25:57
  Speaker 2: this universe as the only life out there right, correct, So,
• 26:01
  Speaker 2: so that is really one of the big questions. So
• 26:03
  Speaker 2: when we see something that's so mysterious and we don't
• 26:07
  Speaker 2: appear to have any reasonable physical explanation for it, it's
• 26:13
  Speaker 2: it's not I mean, it's not the worst thing for
• 26:15
  Speaker 2: us to kind of ponder and go, could this be
• 26:18
  Speaker 2: some signal generated by an intelligence that is trying to
• 26:22
  Speaker 2: signal us to let us know that they're there. Now,
• 26:25
  Speaker 2: Stephen Hawking said that that was a very bad idea.
• 26:28
  Speaker 2: We shouldn't do that. Let's not send out signals saying hey,
• 26:31
  Speaker 2: we're here, because they might actually show up. And if
• 26:33
  Speaker 2: you've ever had the in laws come and stay, you
• 26:35
  Speaker 2: know that this is not the best idea. So anyway, Yeah,
• 26:38
  Speaker 2: so at.
• 26:38
  Speaker 4: The very least, maybe the hey we're here, then whoever
• 26:41
  Speaker 4: receives it may go are you edible?
• 26:44
  Speaker 2: Yeah? I mean which we are?
• 26:46
  Speaker 4: Yeah?
• 26:46
  Speaker 2: We are some species we are, No question.
• 26:49
  Speaker 4: Depends on you know, who's receiving the signal. I suppose.
• 26:52
  Speaker 4: But if they're little green men, maybe we're a giant feast.
• 26:59
  Speaker 2: It's because of the acids. I don't know, something like
• 27:01
  Speaker 2: that anyway. All right, So a story on space dot
• 27:05
  Speaker 2: com is talking about another signal that's mysterious that they
• 27:10
  Speaker 2: weren't necessarily thinking was life. But the usual explanations for
• 27:16
  Speaker 2: fast radio bursts and other kinds of mysterious signals which
• 27:19
  Speaker 2: we now know today a lot of times are having
• 27:21
  Speaker 2: something to do with a supernova, a neutron star, some
• 27:25
  Speaker 2: extreme event out there that we didn't even know at
• 27:28
  Speaker 2: the time that we're writing LGM next to radio data
• 27:31
  Speaker 2: that we didn't even know these objects existed, all right,
• 27:34
  Speaker 2: So this thing is actually a slow and repeating radio
• 27:38
  Speaker 2: signal coming from somewhere in the direction of the Big Dipper.
• 27:43
  Speaker 2: It's a radio pulse that repeats about every two hours,
• 27:47
  Speaker 2: which seems to just be a little bit too slow
• 27:51
  Speaker 2: for your average neutron star spinning around and generating a pulsar.
• 27:56
  Speaker 2: So so astronomers have been trying to figure out what
• 28:00
  Speaker 2: this was, and they've been trying to figure it out
• 28:01
  Speaker 2: by number one, getting a really good pinpoint on where
• 28:06
  Speaker 2: this radio emission is coming from, and then number two
• 28:10
  Speaker 2: tracking it back to whatever object is often that direction
• 28:15
  Speaker 2: that might be generating it. So a new study published
• 28:18
  Speaker 2: by an international team of researchers that's published in the
• 28:21
  Speaker 2: journal Nature believe the lead author was from Australia, by
• 28:25
  Speaker 2: the way, has talked about this rapidly repeating radio No,
• 28:31
  Speaker 2: the slowly repeating radio burst coming from a weird combination
• 28:37
  Speaker 2: of not anything to do with a black hole or
• 28:39
  Speaker 2: a super massive black hole, or a supernova or a
• 28:42
  Speaker 2: neutron star or any of those things. It has to
• 28:45
  Speaker 2: do with something called a white dwarf. A white dwarf
• 28:50
  Speaker 2: is the core of a star like the Sun, that's
• 28:53
  Speaker 2: been left over after that star has reached the end
• 28:57
  Speaker 2: of its life cycle and least all the outer layers
• 29:01
  Speaker 2: of the star, and those outer layers have drifted off
• 29:03
  Speaker 2: into space. Well, this particular white dwarf is in a
• 29:08
  Speaker 2: system with a red dwarf stellar companion. What's a red dwarf?
• 29:13
  Speaker 2: A red dwarf is just a star like the Sun,
• 29:17
  Speaker 2: except a whole lot smaller, so it doesn't glow as hot,
• 29:20
  Speaker 2: so it's redder in color, which actually means cooler, by
• 29:23
  Speaker 2: the way, not hotter. The hotter stars are, the bluer
• 29:27
  Speaker 2: they are, the cooler they are, the redder they are.
• 29:29
  Speaker 2: This isn't a system with a catalog number of designation
• 29:32
  Speaker 2: is ILTJ eleven oh one. And here's the weird thing.
• 29:38
  Speaker 2: The slow repeating radio emissions appear to be coming from
• 29:43
  Speaker 2: white dwarf and red dwarf companion stars in this system.
• 29:49
  Speaker 2: Why would those things be emitting big bursts of radio
• 29:54
  Speaker 2: waves over a kind of a two hour period. So
• 29:57
  Speaker 2: there wasn't a ready explanation for that. When the astronomers
• 30:01
  Speaker 2: traced it back to that source, but now a little
• 30:05
  Speaker 2: bit of modeling has been done. It appears that as
• 30:08
  Speaker 2: these two stars are orpening around one another, that their
• 30:14
  Speaker 2: individual magnetic fields are interacting in some weird way. And yes,
• 30:18
  Speaker 2: a white dwarf can maintain the previous stars magnetic field
• 30:23
  Speaker 2: even after the death of that star. So white dwarfs
• 30:26
  Speaker 2: do have magnetic fields. The white dwarf from the I'm sorry,
• 30:29
  Speaker 2: the magnetic field from the white dwarf and magnetic field
• 30:31
  Speaker 2: from the red dwarf are sweeping through each other, causing
• 30:35
  Speaker 2: some kind of weird interaction as they spin about each other,
• 30:41
  Speaker 2: rotating on their axis and also revolving around one another.
• 30:45
  Speaker 2: And they're putting off this radio burst every couple of
• 30:49
  Speaker 2: hours because of that weird interaction. So here's a whole
• 30:52
  Speaker 2: another different explanation for a repeating radio burst from space
• 30:58
  Speaker 2: that had never been considered before. Check out the story
• 31:01
  Speaker 2: of the mysterious slow repeating radio source on space dot com.
• 31:07
  Speaker 4: All right, just this week on Tuesday, you guys had
• 31:11
  Speaker 4: the April first edition of Music under the Dome. One
• 31:14
  Speaker 4: more chance in this season to check out the show
• 31:17
  Speaker 4: coming up on May sixth. Plus, I know you guys
• 31:20
  Speaker 4: have some astronomy night info on your website as well.
• 31:24
  Speaker 2: So the May the sixth concert in our Music under
• 31:27
  Speaker 2: the Dome series. All the concerts to this point have
• 31:30
  Speaker 2: been students and faculty from the Shop School of Music
• 31:33
  Speaker 2: coming in and performing under the dome in our planetarium
• 31:38
  Speaker 2: with original graphics on the dome produced by visual artists,
• 31:41
  Speaker 2: and that's been the mode and direction of the concert.
• 31:45
  Speaker 2: The concert in May is going to be very different.
• 31:49
  Speaker 2: There's a musical artist by the name of Dan Tepfer
• 31:52
  Speaker 2: who is not associated with Clubstate University. He's coming in
• 31:56
  Speaker 2: to perform Music under the Dome in May as a
• 31:59
  Speaker 2: special show in the concert series because he's going to
• 32:03
  Speaker 2: be playing an amazing instrument in our planetarum called the
• 32:06
  Speaker 2: disc Lavier. The disc Lavier is a nine foot concert
• 32:10
  Speaker 2: grand piano built by Yamaha that has one special characteristic.
• 32:16
  Speaker 2: It's also a starship of computer electronics that can interface
• 32:23
  Speaker 2: with our planetarium dome. And so as Dan Tepfer comes
• 32:27
  Speaker 2: in to play this instrument in our planetarium, the planetarium
• 32:31
  Speaker 2: is actually going to be linked to the visual systems
• 32:35
  Speaker 2: of the planetarium and the visuals produced on the dome
• 32:40
  Speaker 2: are actually going to be generated by the piano itself.
• 32:45
  Speaker 2: Dan Tepfer is a specialist in this interface between music
• 32:51
  Speaker 2: and digital projection. He's going to be coming in for
• 32:54
  Speaker 2: this special edition of Music under the Dome with that
• 32:57
  Speaker 2: disc lavier piano, which does, by the way, belong to
• 33:00
  Speaker 2: the Shop School of Music here at Columbus State University.
• 33:03
  Speaker 2: It was donated by Gail Greenblatt in a very generous
• 33:06
  Speaker 2: donation to the Show Up School, and now the full
• 33:10
  Speaker 2: capabilities of that instrument are going to be on display.
• 33:13
  Speaker 2: Do not miss the May edition of Music under the Dome,
• 33:18
  Speaker 2: a special edition of this concert series the first Tuesday
• 33:22
  Speaker 2: in May. Yes there will still be wine, Yes still
• 33:24
  Speaker 2: there will still be cheese. But then after that we
• 33:27
  Speaker 2: will see Dan Tepf play our planetarium dome with the
• 33:31
  Speaker 2: controller of the disc lavie piano, a one off, a
• 33:35
  Speaker 2: special event in our concert series. Check it out at
• 33:39
  Speaker 2: Space Science Center's website. For ticket information, go visit www
• 33:43
  Speaker 2: dot cc SSC dot org. Charlie Charlie SamSam Charlie dot org.
• 33:49
  Speaker 2: That stands for Coca Cola Space Science Center.
• 33:53
  Speaker 4: Sean and I thank you for listening, and we'll do
• 33:55
  Speaker 4: this again next week. Overhead Door Company of Columbus has
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