S03E137: Jupiter's Storms, Moon's Fiery Past, and Extraterrestrial Cuisine

Hello again, it's Steve here for another episode of Astronomy Daily. It's the twenty sixth of August twenty twenty four, the podcast to be Your Whole Steve Gune Clue Oh and welcome back to Astronomy Daily. Thanks for joining us again. Today we've got a mixed bag for you. We might as well start with the big one. We're going to have a look at something huge, a close look at the Great Red Spot. Now they've been a study and they've found out some interesting things about the Great Red Spot and its history. We're also going to be looking at the Moon and the Moon's history. There's possibility that it was once covered by magma. And there's been a huge competition in the United States to you to be talking about space food and one of the features of space food, well has got me intrigued. And you hear about that later. Don't know if you've heard about Polaris Dawn. Polaris Dawn is going to set a new record. Let's see if they can pull this one off. It's looking very good. But it's also famous for another reason, and we'll look at that and you know, one of the big features or one of the big reasons why space missions are they either get scrubbed or they go ahead. Is the cost. And we'll be going to look at the money, especially in one particular type of missions. So we'll look at the European Lander. And there's a great story about space colonies and the relationships that may or may not a merge between Earth and space colonies in the future. So that's going to be interesting. So over to Halle, take it away, Halle. Thanks Steve. Here's a fascinating story about one of the Solar System's greatest features. Jupiter's Great Red Spot stands out as one of the most iconic features in the Solar sit This massive atmospheric structure, currently spanning a diameter equal to that of Earth, is easily recognizable due to its striking redish hue, which can trast sharply with Jupiter's pale cloud tops. Even small telescopes can capture its distinct appearance. The Great Red Spot is a gigantic anticyclonic vortex, with winds reaching speeds of four hundred and fifty kilometers per hour along its outer edges. It holds the title of the largest and longest lasting vortex in the atmospheres of any planet in our Solar system. However, the exact age of the Great Red Spot is still debated, and the processes behind its formation remain a mystery. Speculation about the origin of the Great Red Spot dates back to the first telescopic observations made by the astronomer Giovanni Domenico Cassini, who in sixteen sixty five discovered a dark oval at the same latitude as the Great Red Spot and named it the Permanent Spot, since it was observed by him and other astronomers until seventeen thirteen. In a recent study, authors first analyzed the evolution of its over time, its structure, and the movements of both meteorological formations, the former Permanent Spot and the Great Red Spot. To do so, the used historical sources dating back to the mid seventeenth century, shortly after the invention of the telescope. From the measurements of sizes and movements, we deduce that it is highly unlikely that the current Great Red Spot was the permanent observed by G. D. Cassini. The Permanent Spot probably disappeared sometime between the mid eighteenth and nineteenth centuries, in which case we can say that the longevity of the Red Spot now exceeds one hundred and ninety years at least, explained Augustine Sanchezlovaga, professor of physics at the UPV slash EHU and who led this research. The Red Spot, which in eighteen seventy nine was thirty nine thousand kilometers in size at its longest axis, has been shrinking to about the current fourteen thousand kilometers and simultaneously becoming more rounded. What is more, since the nineteen seventies, several space missions have studied this meteorological phenomenon closely. Recently, various instruments on board the June omission in orbit around Jupiter have shown that the Great Red Spot is shallow and thin when compared to its horizontal dimension, as vertically it is about five hundred kilometers long, explained Sanchezlovega. Future research will aim to try and reproduce the shrinkage of the Great Red Spot over time in order to find out in greater detail the physical mechanisms underlying its sustainability over time. Data from India's recent Chandrayan three missions supports the idea that an ocean of molten rock once covered the Moon. On August twenty third, twenty twenty three, a lander called Vicrum successfully touched down on the lunar surface. Controllers then deployed a rover called Pregon, which had been stowed on Vicrum, to explore the landing site. The location where Vicrum touched down was further south than any other landing craft had previously been on the Moon. It gave scientists an insight into the geology of the Moon that had not yet been sampled. Pregon's measurements found that the particular mix of chemical l elements in the lunar soil or regolith surrounding the lander was relatively uniform. This regolith was primarily made up of a white rock type called pheroin an orthosite. The scientists say the chemical composition of the lunar South Pole regolith is intermediate between those of samples from two locations in the Moon's equatorial region, those collected by astronauts on the US Apollo sixteen flight in nineteen seventy two and those returned to Earth by the robotic Lunar twenty mission flown by the Soviet Union the same year. The broad similarity in the chemical compositions of all these samples, despite the fact they came from very distant geographical locations on the Moon, supports the idea that a single magma ocean covered the Moon early in its history. The Moon is thought to have formed when a Mars sized planet collided with Earth, ejecting rock that subsequently coalesced to form our planets only satellite. The lunar magma ocean is thought to have been present from its formation to tens or hundreds of millions of years afterwards. The cooling and crystallization of this magma ocean eventually led to the Pharao whae an noorthosite rocks that make up the Moon's crust. NASA challenged the public to make deep space food. It's all about engaging with creative people to find solutions for providing better food for space missions. And here's what happened. The challenge began in twenty twenty one and to date has included more than three hundred teams from thirty two countries. The endeavor is also split between NASA and the Canadian Space Agency. Talk about a spaceborne food fight, Wright Steve. That sounds like fun to me. Halle Winners were selected during the first two phases of the competition and the final Phase three began in September twenty twenty three. For American teams were awarded fifty thousand dollars each and invited to compete in the third and final phase of the competition, during which they had to construct a full scale model of their food production system and demonstrate how it works. Phase three was hosted by the METHUSA Foundation and Ohio State University for two months. The teams tested and demonstrated their technology in Columbus, Ohio at the university's campus. During this period, important milestones had to be passed, including palatability, safety, sensory testing, and harvesting volumes. Each team had a group of Ohio State students known as simunots, that were in charge of the process during the eight week period and collected information to present to a judging panel. Interstellar Lab in Merritt Island, Florida took home the grand prize of seven hundred and fifty thousand dollars. Barbara Belvizi and her team developed a small business that uses a combo of artificial intelligence, advanced equipment, and bioscience to create ingredients that are plant based and can be used in space as well as on Earth. Through its growth system. The food production operation is self sustained, procuring microgreens, vegetables, and even the insects needed to produce micro nutrients. White a minute, insects. That's what it says. Ooh. Then Nolex, a team consisting of researchers from the University of California river Side, was a runner up that received two hundred and fifty thousand dollars for its development of an artificial photosynthetic system that can produce plant and fungal based foods in the absence of biological photosynthesis. The other runner up who took home two hundred and fifty thousand dollars was Jim Sears, the solo creator behind the standing for Safe Appliance, Tidy, Efficient and Delicious sated device. Sears was able to generate different types of customizable food, including peach cobbler and pizza. Okay, that sounds more like it. I'll take your word for it, human. Each product is fire safe and includes a combination of institute grown ingredients and those with an extended shelf life. Did you get that, Steve? Fire safe food? Yeah? Heard that. Maybe they've heard of your interesting cooking skills or lack thereof. Whoah, there's nothing wrong with mark cooking. HELLI don't know child grilled design here until you've tried it. Okay, thank you for joining us for this Monday edition of Astronomy Daily, where we offer just a few stories from the now famous Astronomy Daily newsletter, which you can receive in your email every day, just like Hallie and I do. And to do that, just visit our url Astronomy Daily dot io and place your email address in the slot provided. Just like that, you'll be receiving all the latest news about science, space, science and astronomy from around the world as it's happening. And not only that, you can interact with us by visiting at astro Daily pod on x or at our new Facebook page, which is of course Astronomy Daily on Facebook. See you there, Astronomy Daily. We'll see and Haley Space Space Science and Astronomy. Two women astronauts, will set a spaceflight record next week if all agoes according to plan. The Polaris Dawn mission is schedule to launch atop a SpaceX Falcon nine rocket no earlier than August twenty seven. It aims to perform the first ever private spacewalk and to fly higher above the Earth than any crude spacecraft since the Apollo era, at about fourteen hundred kilometers that's eight hundred and seventy miles for your Americans. The mission is funded and commanded by billionaire Jared Isaacman, who also funded and commanded the private Inspiration for orbital mission in twenty twenty one. Claris Dawn's four person crew includes female mission specialists Sarah Gillis and Anna Menon, both of whom are SpaceX engineers, as well as male pilot Scott kid Pertit The highest flying woman before Gillis and Menon was NASA astronaut Katherine Sullivan, who reached three hundred and eighty miles or six hundred and twenty one kilometers, and that was on STS thirty one during the Space program. According to NASA and Space statistics tracker Jonathan McDowell of the Harvard Smithsonian Institute of Astrophysics, STS thirty one's extreme altitude was the result of its main goal deploying the Hubble Space Telescope. As you might remember, it's a top tier space observatory still active today thanks to the efforts of spacewalking astronauts on five different servicing missions. On board STS thirty one were five astronauts, including Sullivan, who reached space just seven years after NASA flew its first woman astronauts, Sally Ryde, and that was in June nineteen eighty three. The five Hubble servicing missions which flew between nineteen ninety three and twenty oh nine reached lower altitudes than STS thirty one. While a few crude missions arranged farther into space than Hubble's height, all of those missions were crewed by males. That's just a bit of a different take on missions. Instead of talking the technology and the mission directives, we've been talking about genders interesting strange true in listening to a slightly in the podcast. As you might imagine, cost is a major driving factor in the development of space exploration missions. Any new technology or trick that could lower the cost of a mission makes it more appealing for mission planners. Therefore, much of NASA's research goes into those technologies that enable cheaper missions. For example, a few years ago, NASA's Institute for Advanced Concepts that's NIAC supported a project by Michael Van Wilcom of Exoterra Resource to develop a land emission that could support a sample return from Europa. Now, let's have a look at what made that mission different from other Europa mission architectures. The nano Icymoon's propellant harvester NYMPH mission relies on three main advancements for one significant result, a ten times reduction in the overall mission cost. That reduced cost comes mainly from a single fact. The mission's weight has dropped below the threshold where it can be launched by an Atlas five rather than the SLS as similar missions would require. The mission cost estimated for an SLS launched Europa Lander was around five billion dollars, making it prohibitively expensive for NASA or any other agency without significant sacrifices to other missions. Exo Terrace estimates that by using several weight reducing technologies, they could bring the mission price tag down to five hundred million, a much more reasonable sum to garner support from one of the government space programs. Three different technologies would enable this weight and cost to drop. First would be solar electric propulsion, initially designed for use on DART, The second would be a microin situ resource utilization system, and the third would be a power beaming system between the lander and the orbiter. Let's first look at the overall mission architecture and understand how each contributes in nymph. A combined orbital lander will use the Atlas five rocket to get into Earth orbit, and then a solar electric propulsion system was initially designed for use on the DART Asteroid redirect test. Although it was not used during the DART mission, the next Ion thruster was part of the spacecraft that launched, and despite suffering from some technical challenges, it could have allowed the spacecraft to reach its destination. A similar lightweight SCP system could get NYMPH to the Jupiter System, but it could also get the sample back to Earth after the lander collected it. Just how the lander can get that sample back off the Icymoon is the focus of the next major technological step, the UISU system. Nimph's architecture would require using the local ice as propellant. A lander would literally sublimate the ice under its feet, suck up the resultant water vapor, electrolyze it to split it into oxygen and hydrogen, and then liquefy it to store it for use in getting a one kilogram ice core sample back into orbit. Now to do All of this requires power, though, and a lander with a radio isotope thermal generator or similarly commonly used power generation system would be prohibitively heavy. So why not utilize the massive solar array required for the SEP system and beam some of that power down to the lander. That is the concept behind the power beaming system, estimated to produce around two kilowats of power in the Jovian System, about one point eight kilowatts of which could be beamed directly to a land. After the core has been collected and safely launched back into space using a specially designed LOX LH two engine that uses the water collected by THEUISRIU system, the lander meets up with the orbiter, The SEP system kicks back in and delivers the lander back into Earth orbit, where once again it detaches and rides back to Earth's surface inside a standard re entry module. There are some nuances to this entire mission architecture. For example, the SEP system wouldn't work at full capacity in the Jovian System, so a much smaller LOX methane propulsion system is needed to maneuver the orbiter into position. Additionally, the lander would likely have to leave its legs embedded in the EU open ice, as the sublimation process it uses to collect the fuel would likely embed them in place. As you can imagine, there's still plenty of development work on all of these systems that must be completed before any such mission is ready for launch. So as of now, this novel combination of mass saving technologies will not be delivering any icy European sample anytime soon, but someday they just might. Podcast Science. Have you ever thought about what it might be like on an Earth surrounded by colonies in space? One day soon we may have long term orbiting colonies circling the planet in microgravity space stations, with complete self sustained ecosystems, governance bodies, and a completely independent society that operates as a sovereign entity. The relationship between on Earth societies and colonists would likely be very complicated. Several factors could shape this relationship, including a very different living environment for start, economic dependencies, cultural differences, governance structures, and technological advancements. Let's just take a look at some of these. In terms of economics, we can expect a dependence on space colonies for resources such as minerals from asteroids and energy from large solar arrays. Conversely, the colonists would rely on Earth for technological support, food, and other essentials. There would be trade arrangements related to economic independence that might lead to disputes over tariffs, trade routes, and resource allocations. There'd be a divergence in identity because the colonists would develop distinct cultural attributes reflecting a sense of separation from Earth, differences in lifestyle and unique environmental conditions. Ultimately, the colonies would seek governance autonomy from Earth, leading to a variety of negotiations or possible conflicts. Earth based governments might resist this to maintain control over strategic assets. As a result, colonists would demand political representation in Earth based governance structures, potentially leading to the establishment of a new political body or the adaption of existing ones to include colonial interests. One complication might be related to technological development by colonists. For example, colonies might develop unique technologies suited to their environment, potentially giving them an edge over Earth in certain areas. One can imagine robotics, for instance, or some medical developments. Such a situation might lead to competition or collaboration in many cases, over generation, space colonists might physically and psychologically adapt to their environment in ways that significantly differ from Earth's inhabitants. This could affect everything from health policies to social nod. Colonists might prioritize sustainability and environmental concerns differently than people on Earth, leading to conflicting approaches to resource use and environmental protection. Hopefully, Earth and space colonies will maintain a cooperative relationship characterized by mutual respect, beneficial trade, and shared governance structures. Disputes may be resolved through diplomacy and international organization. Sounds a bit like Star Trek, doesn't it a utopian society? On the other hand, rising tensions over autonomy, resource allocation, and cultural differences might lead to frequent conflicts. Earth based governments might impose strict controls, leading to resistance and possible declarations of independence by colonies. The bottom line is that the political relationship between Earth and longtime space colonists would likely evolve through stages of cooperation, conflict, and possibly eventual integration or independence driven by economic, cultural, and technological factors. And there we have it. Another episode of Astronomy Daily from space colonies to fireproof food. I know we cover it all. There's nothing hidden from us here at Astronomy Daily, we cover everything. I've seen you covering the food human Oh Hallie, it's one of your best skills. Oh yes. And on that note, say good night Halle. Good night Halle, you cheeky. Piece of work. Yes, once again, thanks for joining us today, and don't forget Anna and Charlie. During the week, we'll be delivering Astronomy Daily to you, but we will see you all again next week. Bye for now, Bye Host Steve Dunklin,