The 10-billion-year Life Cycle Of The Sun, Illustrated By David Meltzer For National Geographic, May

Ep. 16 Voyager Golden Record - HD and the Void

Full disclosure: this is a kissing story. A kissing story about the ultimate mixtape and alien communication plan, sent out in 1977 and now in interstellar space. Hear about the Voyager Golden Record and the people who put it together as a compila...

The process of making an audio and visual compilation to explain Earth and humanity to an alien species is an incredible undertaking, and Carl Sagan undertook it in 1977. The resulting record from his little team was sent out with the Voyager 1 and 2 probes and is now in interstellar space, but there was also a more personal result of this project. Learn about Sagan and his third wife’s meet-cute and also hear what is actually out there in the stars, conveying the best humanity had to offer in the 70s. 

Below the cut are my sources, music credits, a vocab list, and the transcript of this episode. Vote on what you think I should research next by messaging me here, tweeting at me at @HDandtheVoid, or asking me to my face if you know me in real life. And please subscribe to the podcast on iTunes, rate it and maybe review it, and tell friends if you think they’d like to listen!

(My thoughts on the next episode are space race history, the transit of Venus, Edmond Halley, or Dark Sky Preserves. Next episode will be up on December 4th.)

Glossary

electroencephalography (EEG) - a recording that displays brainwave activity by measuring the electrical impulses of neurons firing in the brain

heliosheath - the outer region of the heliosphere. It is just beyond termination shock, the point where solar wind abruptly slows down and becomes denser and hotter as it presses outward against the approaching wind in interstellar space.

heliosphere - a huge wind sock-shaped bubble that extends beyond Pluto’s orbit and contains our solar system, solar wind, and the entire solar magnetic field.

Transcript

Sources

Drunk History episode transcript

Golden record via NASA

Carl Sagan via Smithsonian Magazine, March 2014

Carl Sagan via Biography.com

Carl Sagan via National Geographic

The Voyager project love story via NASA

Ann Druyen: “We know that EEG patterns register some changes in thought. Would it be possible, I wondered, for a highly advanced technology of several million years from now to actually decipher human thoughts?"

Ann Druyen: "a mental itinerary of the ideas and individuals of history whose memory I hoped to perpetuate."

Ann Druyen: "My feelings as a 27-year-old woman, madly fallen in love, they're on that record. It's forever. It'll be true 100 million years from now. For me, Voyager is a kind of joy so powerful, it robs you of your fear of death."

Arthur C. Clarke: "Please leave me alone; let me go on to the stars."

How 8-track tapes work via 8 Track Heaven

How vinyl records work via The Guardian, June 2010

Golden record via Smithsonian Magazine, April 2012

Golden record via the JPL at NASA

Golden record retrospective by Timothy Ferris via The New Yorker, August 2017

Voyager Golden Record - Greetings In 55 Languages via YouTube

The 116 images NASA wants aliens to see via YouTube

The Voyagers documentary by Penny Lane via Brain Pickings

Ann Druyen: “Carl and I knew we were the beneficiaries of chance, that pure chance could be so kind that we could find one another in the vastness of space and the immensity of time. We knew that every moment should be cherished as the precious and unlikely coincidence that it was.”

Article on Sagan’s divorce from Linda Salzman Sagan via People, December 1980

Article on Sagan’s divorce from Linda Salzman Sagan via The Cornell Daily Sun, March 1981

Voyager record available on Soundcloud via Cosmos Magazine

Golden record now available for purchase via The Atlantic, August 2017

Intro Music: ‘Better Times Will Come’ by No Luck Club off their album Prosperity

Filler Music:  ‘Dark Was The Night, Cold Was The Ground’ by Blind Willie Johnson (1897-1945) off the album Dark Was The Night ‘Carl Sagan’ by Loch Lomond off their album Paper The Walls

Outro Music: ‘Fields of Russia’ by Mutefish off their album On Draught

Talking to a real cosmonaut

I met cosmonaut Sergei Volkov the other day as well as astronaut Andreas Mogensen (yeah I was geeking out hard) and I asked Sergei, after a total of 1½ year in space, what came as the biggest surprise and I expected this grand answer..

but he was like “in space, your t-shirt is floating too. It’s not hanging on you. It’s a weird sensation. There’s not really anything in space that stresses your body which is why we exercise.. like Andreas said, first time in space, you forget that you can just leave your fork floating while you’re opening your food. you try and put it down on a surface or hold everything in your hand like you’re afraid to drop it. And the fact that you can work 10 hours and concentrate really hard and not be sore in your neck.. Because there’s no gravity pulling at you. Dreams change as well after a while. I would dream about doing stuff on the space station but in my dreams there was gravity. It’s such a basic human thing, gravity.”

on the subject of returning back to earth: “Once you get back to earth, the first few days are tough. I took a shower instead of a bath, and it felt like the water was crushing me, I had to step out of the shower, it was just too overwhelming. Holding up your cell phone to your ear, It’s like holding a brick.”

Sharpest View of the Andromeda Galaxy, Ever.

The NASA/ESA Hubble Space Telescope has captured the sharpest and biggest image ever taken of the Andromeda galaxy — a whopping 69,536 x 22,230 pixels. The enormous image is the biggest Hubble image ever released and shows over 100 million stars and thousands of star clusters embedded in a section of the galaxy’s pancake-shaped disc stretching across over 40,000 light-years.

Use the ZOOM TOOL to view in full detail.

(WARNING: May cause existential crisis)

Ep. 32 Black Holes - HD and the Void

I have mentioned black holes in previous episodes, but now feels like the right time to talk about them in their very own episode! I also discuss the new photos of the supermassive black hole in the galaxy Messier 87 and the telescope that was nee...

New Zealand was lovely, but I already touched on what I’d be tempted to talk about with my Southern Stars episode. A person I interviewed as a potential new housemate gave me the idea for this episode because the joy of outer space is truly everywhere and anywhere. The field of astrogeology was not something I had heard of before, though I had indirectly heard of Eugene Shoemaker. I knew the comet Shoemaker-Levy 9 was named after him (and Carolyn Shoemaker, his wife). It turns out he basically founded the modern field of astrogeology! So I talk about him for quite a while, too.

Below the cut are the glossary, transcript, sources, and music credits. Send me any topic suggestions via Tumblr message (you don’t need an account to do this, just submit as anonymous). You can also tweet at me on Twitter at @HDandtheVoid, or you can ask me to my face if you know me in real life. Subscribe on iTunes to get the new episodes of my semi-monthly podcast, and please please please rate and review it. Go ahead and tell friends if you think they’d like to hear it, too!

(The next episode is definitely going to be on famous comets, and I’m hoping to publish that episode in May.)

Glossary

active galaxy - a galaxy with a small core of emission embedded at the center. This core is typically very variable and very bright compared to the rest of the galaxy. These galaxies emit much more energy than they should; this excess energy is found in the infrared, radio, UV, and X-ray regions of the electromagnetic spectrum.

black hole -  a region of spacetime where a great deal of mass and energy have been compressed into a relatively small space. Black holes exert such strong gravitational effects that no mass or energy, not even light, can escape from inside them. There are supermassive black holes in galaxies that contribute to the development and life cycle of galaxies.

blazar - a subcategory of active galaxy, it is an extremely bright, distant object, powered by a black hole, which emits massive amounts of energy. It is distinct from a quasar because it is even brighter.

interferometry - a group of techniques to extract information from superimposing electromagnetic waves to create interference. In radio astronomy, this is done by using a wide spread of receivers to look at the same distant object, then bringing that data together with a correlator that can create a larger, clearer picture than an individual radio telescope alone could.

Messier object - a deep-sky object included on a list of 103-110 deep-sky objects made by Charles Messier and his colleagues in the 18th century in an attempt to prevent fuzzy, bright objects from being confused with comets.

torus - a donut shape.

quasar - a distant, massive celestial object that emits extremely large amounts of energy. These star-like objects may reflect a stage in the evolution of some galaxies.

Script/Transcript

Sources

Black Holes, explained via National Geographic

What Is a Black Hole? via NASA

Black Holes via NASA

Black Hole via Swinburne University of Technology

Darkness Visible, Finally: Astronomers Capture First Ever Image of a Black Hole via the New York Times (April 2019)

Event Horizon Telescope

Astronomers Capture First Image of a Black Hole via ESO (April 2019)

How They Took the First Picture of a Black Hole via New York Times (April 2019)

Intro Music: ‘Better Times Will Come’ by No Luck Club off their album Prosperity

Filler Music: ‘Flame On Flame (A Slow Dirge)’ by Kishi Bashi off his album Sonderlust

Outro Music: ‘Fields of Russia’ by Mutefish off their album On Draught

Hahaha, right after I start out a podcast talking about how we’ll never poke the Sun, it turns out we’re sending a probe to do just that!

Solar System: Things to Know This Week

Mark your calendars for summer 2018: That’s when we’re launching a spacecraft to touch the sun. 

In honor of our first-ever mission to the heart of the solar system, this week we’re delving into the life and times of this powerful yellow dwarf star.

1. Meet Parker 

Parker Solar Probe, our first mission to go to the sun, is named after Eugene Parker, an American astrophysicist who first theorized that the sun constantly sends out a flow of particles and energy called the solar wind. This historic mission will explore one of the last regions of the solar system to be visited by a spacecraft and help scientists unlock answers to questions they’ve been pondering for more than five decades.

2. Extra SPF, Please 

Parker Solar Probe will swoop within 4 million miles of the sun’s surface, facing heat and radiation like no spacecraft before it. The mission will provide new data on solar activity to help us better understand our home star and its activity - information that can improve forecasts of major space-weather events that could impact life on Earth.

3. Majorly Massive 

The sun is the center of our solar system and makes up 99.8 percent of the mass of the entire solar system. If the sun were as tall as a typical front door, Earth would be about the size of a nickel.

4. Different Spin 

Since the sun is not a solid body, different parts of the sun rotate at different rates. At the equator, the sun spins once about every 25 days, but at its poles the sun rotates once on its axis every 36 Earth days.

5. Can’t Stand on It

The sun is a star and a star doesn’t have a solid surface. Rather, it’s a ball of ionized gas 92.1% hydrogen (H2) and 7.8% helium (He) held together by its own gravity.

6. Center of Attention 

The sun isn’t a planet, so it doesn’t have any moons. But, the sun is orbited by eight planets, at least five dwarf planets, tens of thousands of asteroids, and hundreds of thousands to trillions of comets and icy bodies.

7. It’s Hot in There 

And we mean really, really hot. The temperature at the sun’s core is about 27 million degrees Fahrenheit. However, its atmosphere, the corona, can reach temperatures of 3 million degrees. (That’s as if it got hotter the farther away you got from a fire, instead of cooler!) Parker Solar Probe will help scientists solve the mystery of why the corona’s temperature is so much higher than the surface.

8. Travel Conditions

The sun influences the entire solar system, so studying it helps us better understand the space weather that our astronauts and spacecraft travel through.

9. Life on the Sun? 

Better to admire from afar. Thanks to its hot, energetic mix of gases and plasma, the sun can’t be home to living things. However, we can thank the sun for making life on Earth possible by providing the warmth and energy that supply Earth’s food chain.

10. Chance of a Lifetime 

Last but not least, don’t forget that the first total solar eclipse to sweep across the U.S. from coast-to-coast since 1918 is happening on August 21, 2017. Our toolkit has you need to know to about it. 

Want to learn more? Read our full list of the 10 things to know this week about the solar system HERE.

Make sure to follow us on Tumblr for your regular dose of space: http://nasa.tumblr.com

The Birth of a New Star. IRAS 14568-6304

via reddit

Of Course I Still Love You returned to Port Canaveral earlier this morning with the SES-10 Falcon 9 first stage. Since this is the first Falcon 9 rocket to be reflown this marks the second time this particular rocket returned to port after landing. The images above were captured by remote cameras on the droneship and show the vehicle coming into land. Falcon 9 landed eight minutes after a March 30 liftoff from LC-39A at Kennedy Space Center. Extensive scorching is visible on the exterior of the rocket including the interstage and grid fins. The fins themselves were seen glowing during launch footage as the booster returned to Earth. Each fin is coated in ablative paint which helps protect the metal but the severe temperatures of reentry still cause the fins to glow. Since SES-10 was placed into Geostationary Transfer Orbit, not enough propellant remained in the first stage’s tanks to allow for a nominal reentry profile and the boostback burn was not performed. As such, the rocket came in over twice its normal landing speed and eight times hotter than flights which have a boostback burn. This particular rocket will not be reused after recovery; Elon Musk stated in the SES-10 post-launch news conference that the rocket will likely be given to the Air Force for display at either Cape Canaveral or Kennedy Space Center. P/C: SpaceX

Ep. 29 Unusual Scales - HD and the Void

From Bortle to Torino, from asteroids to aliens, scientists have been working to classify experiences in a useful way. Some of those experiences are very specific, unusual, speculative, or just bizarre. Hear about a selection of scales currently i...

I’m back with the last episode of 2018! A conversation with a friend sparked this idea and I just ran with it while I had the inspiration, so please enjoy an episode on the strange and wonderful scales that astronomers have created to quantify data that is very unusual. 

Below the cut are the glossary, transcript, sources, and music credits. Send me any topic suggestions via Tumblr message (you don’t need an account for it!). You can also tweet at me on Twitter at @HDandtheVoid, or you can ask me to my face if you know me. Subscribe on iTunes to get the new episodes of my ideally-monthly-updated podcast (I hope I have more inspiration/time in 2019), and please please please rate and review it. Go ahead and tell friends if you think they’d like to hear it, too!

(My thoughts on the next episode are the Coriolus Force, Stephen Hawking, or famous comets. The next episode will go up in 2019, hopefully in early January!)

Glossary

background risk - the average risk from random impacts of space objects with Earth.

Bortle Scale - an objective scale to measure the clarity and effect of light pollution on a night’s stargazing.

Drake Equation - a way to estimate the number of potential active, communicative civilizations in the Milky Way galaxy based on 1) the average rate of star formation in our galaxy 2) the fraction of those stars that have planets 3) the average number of planets that can potentially support life per star with its own orbiting planets 4) the fraction of planets that could support life which actually develop life at some point 5) the fraction of planets with life that actually go on to develop intelligent life and civilizations 6) the fraction of civilizations that develop a technology that releases detectable signs of their existence into space 7) the length of time it would take those civilizations release detectable signals into space.

Hynek Scale - quantifies encounters with UFOs and aliens.

Kardashev Scale - measures how advanced a civilization’s technology is based on their mastery of resources and exploration into space.

METI - Messaging to ExtraTerrestrial Intelligence

Palermo Technical Impact Hazard Scale - categorizes and prioritizes the potential impact risks of objects in space, such as asteroids.

Rio Scale - quantifies the impact of any public announcement regarding evidence of extraterrestrial intelligence.

San Marino Scale - quantifies the impact of sending transmissions from Earth to extraterrestrial intelligence.

SETI - the Search for ExtraTerrestrial Intelligence.

Torino Scale - communicates the risk associated with a particular asteroid or comet’s potential to impact with Earth to the public.

Script/Transcript

Sources

10 Unusual Scientific Scales via Listverse (Sep 2010)

John Bortle’s article on his magnitude scale via Sky and Telescope, July 2006

“I have created a nine-level scale. It is based on nearly 50 years of observing experience. I hope it will prove both enlightening and useful to observers — though it may stun or even horrify some! Should it come into wide use, it would provide a consistent standard for comparing observations with light pollution.”

Bortle dark sky scale via Big Sky Astronomy Club

Bortle dark sky scale via LSU

Palermo Technical Impact Hazard Scale via NASA

The Palermo Scale is the base-10 logarithm of the relative risk.

PS = log10 R.

The relative risk R is given by R = PI / (fB × DT), where PI is the impact probability of the event in question and DT is the time until the potential event, measured in years. 

The annual background impact frequency, fB = 0.03 × E-4/5, is the annual probability of an impact event with energy (E, in megatons of TNT) at least as large as the event in question.

Torino Impact Hazard Scale via NASA

Rio Scale via SETI League

San Marino Scale via SETI League

Rio and San Marino Scale history via Wikipedia

Drake Equation via Wikipedia

Nikolai Kardashev via Wikipedia

"energy consumption at ≈4×1019 erg/sec (4 × 1012 watts)."

New Variation of Kardashev Scale Developed via Edgy Labs (June 2018)

J. Allen Hynek's Scale Of UFO Classification via The Night Sky

Hynek's UFO Classification System via The Center for UFO Studies

Intro Music: ‘Better Times Will Come’ by No Luck Club off their album Prosperity

Outro Music: ‘Fields of Russia’ by Mutefish off their album On Draught

Cost per kg for human spaceflight

via reddit