S02E21: Metallica's "Fuel" Rocks Artemis Mission // Lunar Mission // Supernova Observations

Hello again and welcome to Astronomy Daily. I'm Steve your host, and we've got supernovas and Artemis and Hallie will be back with us again. Stay with us, Yes, that's right, another episode of Astronomy Daily. Thanks for joining us and with us as usual, Hallie, how are you hi, Steve. Great to be back. So what have we got on today, Hallie? Well, I'm talking about a new YouTube video about Artemis that features a soundtrack by the metal band Metallica. Yeah, why not rock a rocket? Funny? And you are covering the launch of the Indian Space Research Organizations chandray any three lunar mission. Yeah, yeah. Did you hear how much it costs them? No? Oh, wait till you hear. I couldn't believe it's based on a budget. And I think you're looking at how NASA will be examining volcanic terrain on the Moon with new instruments that's on board the Artemis mission. Anything else, Hollie, Hellie? Yes? Aren't you doing something about sandwiches? All right? Sandwich planets? Yes? And also there's a story about a record number of amateur astronomers joined in a city run program to observe a close up, soup and over. That sounds pretty exciting, so let's get it on the air. Hellie, Ohkies, here we go. A new video from NASA features Metallica's song Fuel alongside epic footage of Artemis one, the mission that debuted the agency's huge new moon rocket, the Space Launch System SLS. Give Me Fuel, Give Me Fire, the award winning metal band sings on top of their characteristic power chords. The YouTube video also shows Artemis ones SLS flying high into the night sky from different angles. Artemis one was a success, sending an uncrewed Orion capsule to lunar or bit and back. NASA is now gearing up for Artemis two, which will send four people around the Moon no earlier than November twenty twenty four. In April, NASA named the four astronauts who will be on board. The agency's read wiseman Victor Glover and Christina Koch, and the Canadian Space Agencies Jeremy Hansen rock on Artemis. As part of NASA's regular cadence of robotic lunar missions. Through Artemis, the agency has selected a new scientific payload to establish the age and composition of hilly terrain created by volcanic activity on the near side of the Moon. The DIMPLE Instrument Suite short for Dating an irregular mare patch with a lunar explorer will investigate the Aina irregular mare patch discovered in nineteen seventy one by Apollo fifteen orbital images. Learning more about this mound will address outstanding questions about the evolution of the Moon, which in turn can provide clues to the history of the entire Solar system. Dimple will help determine whether irregular mare patches formed from recent or ancient volcanic processes. The mission will make use of a CLPS provided rover, a collection gripping instrument, and a spectrometer that can help determine the composition of the lunar material to analyze the age and composition of samples collected from the surface of Aina. Dimple will be able to collect and analyze anywhere from three to more than twenty five samples to learn more about the timing of the volcanic activity that formed this feature. For example, if the volcanic activity turns out to be geologically recent, it implies that either the lunar mantle was warmer than previously thought, or that radioactive elements contributed to small scale eruptions continuing later in lunar evolution than previously thought. Either scenario would help us better understand the geochemical state of the Moon over time. If, on the other hand, the eruptions creating Aina turn out to be it would lead to reevaluating the age and evolution of craters on the Moon, which would have implications for understanding the history of Earth and other planets in the Solar System. The closest cosmic explosion to Earth in the last ten years became a record breaker for the Search for Extraterrestrial Intelligence Institute. The supernova designated SN twenty twenty three X, was first spotted on May nineteenth, twenty twenty three by Japanese amateur astronomer Koichi Idagaki. Just an hour after this manifestation, amateur astronomers taking part in SETI, an Unastellar's cosmic Cataclysms program were on the case. A record number of observers, including citizens scientists in the form of amateur astronomers, came together to collect data from a supernova that took place in the Pinwell Galaxy, a spiral galaxy located approximately twenty one million light years from Earth. With the data, scientists could bet understand the behavior of this class of supernovas, known as type two cosmic explosions, that occur when massive stars run out of fuel for nuclear fusion and can no longer protect themselves against gravitational collapse. The effort involved one hundred and twenty three dedicated amateur astronomers making two hundred and fifty two observations with one hundred and fifteen telescopes following how light from the supernova changed over time, first seeing its escalating brightness and then tracking its gradual fading. This allowed the SETI scientists to build a profile for the supernova that astronomers called the light curve, a measurement of its brightness over time. And the story isn't over four s N twenty twenty three X. The supernova is expected to remain visible until at least August twenty twenty three, and while this is the case, the amateur astronomers of the Cosmic Cataclysms program will continue to monitor its progress. And that's all the news from me over to you in the kitchen with your planet sandwiches to astronomy. Yes, thanks for staying with us. It's Astronomy Daily with Steve. It's good to see the Indian Space Research Organization got Chan Drean Shree up into the into space on Friday. That's great news. And they did it on a budget. And we'll hear about that in a second. Fantastic news. All sorts of things going on. I hear that China is going to be launching their own array of strings of satellites as well, so not to be done. They've got their own plans as usuals leave it its Chinese. Okay, on with the show now, this is exciting. On Friday, India launched a rocket carrying an unmanned spacecraft to land on the Moon. It's its second attempt to do so as it's cut price space program it seeks to reach new heights. The heavyweight LVM three M four rocket lifted off from Shiharakota in the southern state of Andra Pradesh, carrying the Chandre and three spacecraft. As thousands of enthusiasts clapped and cheered, Chandra and three began its journey to the Moon. Health of the spacecraft is normal, said the Indian Space Research Organization on Twitter. The world's most populous nation has a comparatively low budget aerospace program that is rapidly closing on the milestones set by global space powers. Only Russia, the United States, and China have previously achieved a controlled landing on the lunar surface. India's last attempt to do so ended in failure four years ago when the ground control lost contact moments before landing. I think that was chandre And two and landing got to one point three kilometers above the surface. If memory a new chapter in space in India's space odyssey, Prime Minister Narendromodi tweeted from France, where he was taking part in the Bastil Day Parade or watching it in Paris. It saws high elevating the dreams and ambitious ambitions of every Indian. Rightly so if the rest of the current mission goes according to plan. The chandre In three, which means mooncraft in Sanskrit, were safely touched down near the Moon's little explored south pole between August twenty three and twenty four, developed by R. Chandre And three, includes a lander module named Victram which means valor in Sanskrit, and a rover named Pangyan which means wisdom. The mission comes with a price tag of seventy four point six million, far smaller than those of other countries and testament to India's frugal space engineering. Sure doesn't sound like an awful lot of money, does it. Experts say India can keep costs low by copying and adapting existing space technology, and thanks to an abundance of highly skilled engineers who here's the key, earn a fraction of their foreign counterparts wages. Chandran three spacecraft will take much longer to reach the Moon than the Mandapollo missions of the sixties and seventies, which arrived in a matter of days. The Indian rocket is much less powerful than the United States Sat and five, and instead the probe will orbit the Earth five or six times elliptically to gain speed before being sent on a month long lunar trajectory. The rover has a mission life of one lunar day or fourteen Earth days, and if the landing is successful, little roll off Victram and explore the nearby lunar area, gathering images to be sent back to Earth for analysis. India's space program has grown suitably in size and momentum since since it first sent a probe to orbit the Moon in two thousand and eight. In twenty fourteen, it became the first Asian nation to put a satellite into orbit around Mars, and three years later the launched one hundred and for satellites in a single mission. The issro's Gaganion spacecraft program is slated to launch a three day manned mission into Earth's orbit by next year. India is also working to boost its two percent share of the global commercial space market by sending private payloads into orbit for a fraction at the cost of its competitors now. A recent study presented at the National Astronomy Meeting in twenty twenty three NAM twenty twenty three examines a newly discovered planetary formation the theory that challenges previous notions on how planets actually formed in disks of gas surrounding young stars, also known as proto planetary disks. Based on data from observations and models, the researchers determined that two large protoplanets planets that are still forming and gathering dust from throughout the disk also known as accretion, orbiting at an indeterminate distance from each other, can produce a smaller planet orbiting between them, which the researchers refer to as a sandwiched planet formation. They surmise that this is due to the two larger planets limiting the amount of dust that flows into the inner portions of the protoplanetary disks, since they both will continue to collect it. When this happens, any planet that forms between them will be smaller than the two planets, which is analogous to the filling inside a sandwich. Researchers say that what is really interesting is that there are examples that have been found from exoplanet observations that actually show this sandwich planet architecture, where the middle planet is less massive than its neighbors. Further studies are required to better understand this new formation process, but it could lead to developing plausible clarifications for the existence of Mars and Uranus, which are both smaller planets orbiting between larger planets in our own Solar System. In the case of Mars, the larger Earth orbits inward, while the much larger Jupiter orbits outward. In the case of Uranus, the much larger Satin orbits inward, while the smaller sized Neptune orbits outward. While the radius of Uranus is greater than Neptune, the former's mass is smaller, and this is due to Neptune's density of being approximately thirty percent greater than Uranus. The current state of our Solar System consists of a mostly neat and organized assemblage of planets, moons, asteroids, and comets. This includes the Sun at the center, followed by the inner planets, the asteroid belt, outer planets, Kuyper Belt, and Aught Cloud. But things were much different approximately four point six billion years ago. And that's all we have time for today. For joining us on Astronomy Daily, I'm Steve with a sore throat and a upset tummy. I hope that didn't get in the way of anything. I certainly didn't have Planet Sandridges Hallie, wherever you've gone to, she's run off. But anyway, I hope you'll join us next time. I'm glad to have your acquaintance. Please don't forget. You can always leave your messages on our Facebook page which is space Nuts podcast group. I know and for all the past episodes. So if you can go to a space nuts dot io that'll catch all the episodes of space Nuts with Andrew Dunkley and Professor Fred Watson and all the episodes of Astronomy Davie with Tim Gibbs and Steve Dunkley. Thanks again for joining us, See you later, Hallie, see you next time. Everyone back in time to say Tatar all right by everyone, your whole leaven le