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Cosmic Bubbles, Pancake Volcanoes, and 50 Years of the European Space Agency
In this exciting episode of Space Nuts , host Heidi Campo and the ever-knowledgeable Professor Fred Watson explore a range of fascinating topics that stretch the imagination. From the discovery of a perfectly spherical cosmic bubble to the intriguing pancake volcanoes of Venus, and a celebration of the European Space Agency's 50th anniversary, this episode is a must-listen for all space enthusiasts.
Episode Highlights:
- The Cosmic Bubble Telios: Fred shares insights into a newly discovered cosmic bubble, dubbed Telios, that is captivating astronomers with its geometric perfection. The duo discusses the significance of this discovery and the technology behind the radio imaging that revealed this stunning celestial object.
- Pancake Volcanoes on Venus: The conversation shifts to Venus, where unique pancake-shaped volcanic formations have sparked curiosity among scientists. Fred explains the geological processes that may lead to the formation of these unusual structures and how they differ from typical volcanoes on Earth.
- Celebrating 50 Years of ESA: The episode wraps up with a look at the European Space Agency's 50th anniversary and the release of commemorative coins. Heidi and Fred discuss the significance of ESA's contributions to space exploration and the design elements of the newly minted coins, inviting listeners to engage in a scavenger hunt to decode their mysteries.
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Stay curious, keep looking up, and join us next time for more stellar insights and cosmic wonders. Until then, clear skies and happy stargazing.
(00:00) Welcome to Space Nuts with Heidi Campo and Fred Watson
(01:20) Discussion on the discovery of the cosmic bubble Telios
(15:00) Exploring pancake volcanoes on Venus
(25:30) Celebrating 50 years of the European Space Agency
For commercial-free versions of Space Nuts, join us on Patreon, Supercast, Apple Podcasts, or become a supporter here: https://www.spreaker.com/podcast/space-nuts-astronomy-insights-cosmic-discoveries--2631155/support (https://www.spreaker.com/podcast/space-nuts-astronomy-insights-cosmic-discoveries--2631155/support?utm_source=rss&utm_medium=rss&utm_campaign=rss) .
Episode link: https://play.headliner.app/episode/27507268?utm_source=youtube
00:00:00 --> 00:00:02 Well, welcome back to another fantastic,
00:00:02 --> 00:00:05 wonderful, out of thisworld episode of
00:00:05 --> 00:00:08 Space Nuts. 15 seconds. Guidance is
00:00:08 --> 00:00:13 internal. 10 9 Ignition sequence start.
00:00:13 --> 00:00:19 Space Nuts. 5 4 3 2 1 2 3 4 5 5 4 3 2 1
00:00:19 --> 00:00:21 Space Nuts. Astronauts Report. It feels
00:00:22 --> 00:00:25 good. I'm your host for this summer,
00:00:25 --> 00:00:28 Heidi Compo. And joining me is our
00:00:28 --> 00:00:31 stupendous, spectacular, Professor Fred
00:00:31 --> 00:00:34 Watson, astronomer at large. Hello,
00:00:34 --> 00:00:36 Fred. How are you doing on this
00:00:36 --> 00:00:38 wonderful morning of yours, afternoon of
00:00:38 --> 00:00:41 mine? Yeah. Um, pretty good, thank you,
00:00:41 --> 00:00:43 Heidi. It the sun is shining. Uh, it was
00:00:43 --> 00:00:45 very foggy first thing. Uh, and of
00:00:45 --> 00:00:48 course, we're not uh in summer, we're in
00:00:48 --> 00:00:51 winter. Uh, so uh you're with us for the
00:00:51 --> 00:00:54 whole winter. Today uh sorry yesterday
00:00:54 --> 00:00:56 uh is the first day of winter in
00:00:56 --> 00:00:59 Australia. They start the seasons on the
00:00:59 --> 00:01:01 first of the month. Uh so the 1st of
00:01:01 --> 00:01:04 June is the first day of winter. And it
00:01:04 --> 00:01:06 was a nice day yesterday as well.
00:01:06 --> 00:01:09 Typically weather here is is cold and
00:01:09 --> 00:01:13 sunny. And by cold I mean oh 12 13 14
00:01:13 --> 00:01:16 Celsius something like that up to about
00:01:16 --> 00:01:21 uh yeah 60° 60° Fahrenheit will be will
00:01:21 --> 00:01:23 be cool for us. That's good weather. I
00:01:23 --> 00:01:26 think that the 60s the 70s are perfect.
00:01:26 --> 00:01:28 When you start getting into the Houston
00:01:28 --> 00:01:30 heat and humidity and you're working in
00:01:30 --> 00:01:33 the blistering 90s with you know 80%
00:01:33 --> 00:01:35 humidity I think people tend to start
00:01:35 --> 00:01:38 not enjoying that as much. No, I
00:01:38 --> 00:01:42 understand. So, we have some really fun
00:01:42 --> 00:01:45 topics today. Today, we are looking at
00:01:45 --> 00:01:48 all sorts of things from space bubbles
00:01:48 --> 00:01:51 to pancake volcanoes. This sounds like
00:01:51 --> 00:01:53 we're making a recipe and we're
00:01:53 --> 00:01:56 finishing off with celebrating 50 years
00:01:56 --> 00:01:59 of the European Space Agency with uh
00:01:59 --> 00:02:02 some special collector's items. So
00:02:02 --> 00:02:05 without further ado, let's jump right
00:02:05 --> 00:02:07 into today's topics.
00:02:08 --> 00:02:10 Yeah, thanks Heidi. And uh I love this
00:02:10 --> 00:02:13 first story partly because uh it is
00:02:13 --> 00:02:16 visually completely inspiring and I'll
00:02:16 --> 00:02:19 point our listeners to the uh the
00:02:19 --> 00:02:21 website in a minute, but also because it
00:02:21 --> 00:02:23 uh the it's research. It's got a cast of
00:02:23 --> 00:02:25 thousands like many research topics do
00:02:25 --> 00:02:27 these days but it's led by a good friend
00:02:27 --> 00:02:31 of mine Miruslaf Mirislav Philop
00:02:31 --> 00:02:33 Mirislav Philopovich sorry Miruslav if
00:02:33 --> 00:02:35 you're listening uh he's the professor
00:02:35 --> 00:02:38 of astronomy and astrophysics at Western
00:02:38 --> 00:02:41 Sydney University uh and in fact I have
00:02:41 --> 00:02:43 a an honorary appointment with the
00:02:43 --> 00:02:45 university so I know Miruslav well he's
00:02:46 --> 00:02:49 a very able radio astronomer uh with uh
00:02:49 --> 00:02:52 many um really important pieces of work
00:02:52 --> 00:02:56 under his belt. But I think this one is
00:02:56 --> 00:02:58 um not just spectacular from a
00:02:58 --> 00:03:00 scientific point of view, but it is
00:03:00 --> 00:03:03 incredibly beautiful because what he and
00:03:03 --> 00:03:05 in fact I think he made the initi in
00:03:05 --> 00:03:07 initial discovery himself. What they've
00:03:07 --> 00:03:12 discovered is it's well it's been called
00:03:12 --> 00:03:15 a cosmic bubble but it is perfectly
00:03:15 --> 00:03:18 circular uh to our eyes which means it's
00:03:18 --> 00:03:21 probably perfectly spherical. If you
00:03:21 --> 00:03:23 want to have a look at it, um the um the
00:03:23 --> 00:03:25 um news item I was looking at is
00:03:25 --> 00:03:27 actually on space.com. Uh but I think
00:03:28 --> 00:03:29 it's being covered by many of the
00:03:29 --> 00:03:33 science news outlets. Uh and it the you
00:03:33 --> 00:03:36 know the uh title of that uh space.com
00:03:36 --> 00:03:38 page is a quote from Miruslav, one of
00:03:38 --> 00:03:41 the most geometrically perfect. Uh and
00:03:41 --> 00:03:43 they ask what is this mysterious sphere
00:03:43 --> 00:03:45 deep in the Milky Way galaxy? So what
00:03:45 --> 00:03:49 we've got is uh it comes from a radio
00:03:49 --> 00:03:54 image of the sky uh taken with uh one of
00:03:54 --> 00:03:57 the great uh new radio telescopes here
00:03:57 --> 00:03:59 in Australia, an instrument called
00:03:59 --> 00:04:04 ASCAP. Uh ASCAP is situated in Western
00:04:04 --> 00:04:07 Australia at a site which has a long
00:04:07 --> 00:04:09 name. It's the Merchesen radioastronomy
00:04:09 --> 00:04:12 observatory in Yarimana Ilgari Bundura.
00:04:12 --> 00:04:14 And the last three words of that name
00:04:14 --> 00:04:17 are uh uh Wajgery language. They're the
00:04:17 --> 00:04:19 traditional owners of that site. And
00:04:19 --> 00:04:21 it's a wajgery expression meaning
00:04:21 --> 00:04:24 sharing sky and stars. So uh it's a very
00:04:24 --> 00:04:26 well-n named observatory site. Now that
00:04:26 --> 00:04:30 is where the uh what's called SKA low
00:04:30 --> 00:04:33 the uh Australian half of the square
00:04:33 --> 00:04:35 kilometer array observatory's big new
00:04:36 --> 00:04:37 telescope that's currently being built
00:04:37 --> 00:04:39 there. And uh I think we've talked about
00:04:39 --> 00:04:41 it before, Heidi, the fact that it's not
00:04:41 --> 00:04:43 a steerable dish. This is a telescope
00:04:43 --> 00:04:45 that looks like a forest full of
00:04:45 --> 00:04:47 Christmas trees, metal Christmas trees
00:04:47 --> 00:04:50 which stand there um and are steered
00:04:50 --> 00:04:52 electronically. It's extraordinary
00:04:52 --> 00:04:54 technology. But as well as that, there
00:04:54 --> 00:04:57 is a set of I think it's 36 if I
00:04:57 --> 00:04:59 remember rightly steerable dishes uh
00:04:59 --> 00:05:02 which form what is called ASCAP, the
00:05:02 --> 00:05:04 Australian square kilometer array
00:05:04 --> 00:05:06 pathfinder. And that was the instrument
00:05:06 --> 00:05:08 uh that Miruslav Miruslav and his
00:05:08 --> 00:05:12 colleagues uh used to find this curious
00:05:12 --> 00:05:16 object. They uh in fact it was one of
00:05:16 --> 00:05:18 the surveys publicly available surveys
00:05:18 --> 00:05:21 of the sky, the radio sky that have come
00:05:21 --> 00:05:24 from ASCAP and he spotted because of his
00:05:24 --> 00:05:27 eagle eyes uh in the readouts he spotted
00:05:27 --> 00:05:32 this ring of material. Uh it's got a few
00:05:32 --> 00:05:35 oddities about it. First of all, uh as I
00:05:35 --> 00:05:38 said already, it's perfectly spherical.
00:05:38 --> 00:05:40 Uh we see it as a circle, but it's
00:05:40 --> 00:05:43 almost certainly a sphere. Uh because we
00:05:43 --> 00:05:45 don't look from any preferred direction.
00:05:45 --> 00:05:49 But the other thing is that it only uh
00:05:50 --> 00:05:53 emits its radiation at radio
00:05:53 --> 00:05:57 wavelengths. Um, and there's just a hint
00:05:57 --> 00:06:00 of uh of visible light coming from
00:06:00 --> 00:06:03 hydrogen, but most of it is radio
00:06:03 --> 00:06:06 wavelengths. And that flies in the face
00:06:06 --> 00:06:08 of what we know about objects of this
00:06:08 --> 00:06:10 kind because it is probably what's
00:06:10 --> 00:06:13 called a supernova remnant. A bubble in
00:06:13 --> 00:06:16 space which uh comes from an exploding
00:06:16 --> 00:06:20 star uh probably centuries ago maybe uh
00:06:20 --> 00:06:22 because they haven't quite figured out
00:06:22 --> 00:06:24 how big this thing is yet. Uh but an
00:06:24 --> 00:06:26 exploding star that's kind of carved a
00:06:26 --> 00:06:29 cavity in the gas uh in which it's
00:06:29 --> 00:06:32 immersed. And that gas is very rarified.
00:06:32 --> 00:06:33 It's what we call the interstellar
00:06:33 --> 00:06:35 medium. Wow. But when you get an
00:06:35 --> 00:06:39 explosion, it will carve out uh that uh
00:06:39 --> 00:06:42 that sort of spherical chamber. So
00:06:42 --> 00:06:45 that's uh what they are assuming it is.
00:06:45 --> 00:06:47 Uh the the kind of important bit I
00:06:47 --> 00:06:50 haven't mentioned. Uh which is that
00:06:50 --> 00:06:52 they've given it a lovely name which is
00:06:52 --> 00:06:58 Telos. Uh it is spelled with T E L E I O
00:06:58 --> 00:07:01 S and it's a Greek word meaning
00:07:01 --> 00:07:04 perfection. And that's because it is.
00:07:04 --> 00:07:06 It's a perfect looking sphere. Quite
00:07:06 --> 00:07:08 extraordinary. It really is beautiful.
00:07:08 --> 00:07:11 It looks like just this cosmic marble
00:07:11 --> 00:07:14 floating. But the other interesting
00:07:14 --> 00:07:16 thing to me that maybe you can explain a
00:07:16 --> 00:07:18 little bit more, um, I'm sure half of
00:07:18 --> 00:07:20 your listeners probably already know
00:07:20 --> 00:07:22 this, but some of us don't. But the
00:07:22 --> 00:07:26 sphere has this greenish, blackish tint
00:07:26 --> 00:07:29 to it, but so does all the other matter
00:07:29 --> 00:07:33 around it. So, what is making up this
00:07:33 --> 00:07:35 sphere versus the matter around it
00:07:35 --> 00:07:37 that's distinct but looks the same
00:07:37 --> 00:07:39 color-wise?
00:07:39 --> 00:07:42 So, the color that you're seeing uh
00:07:42 --> 00:07:45 is remember we're looking at radio
00:07:45 --> 00:07:48 wavelengths. We're not looking at uh you
00:07:48 --> 00:07:51 know a visible light image. And so the
00:07:51 --> 00:07:55 color comes from uh the processing that
00:07:55 --> 00:07:58 has been done to this image. Um, and
00:07:58 --> 00:08:02 it's probably uh that there's a color
00:08:02 --> 00:08:04 bar. I I actually looked at the original
00:08:04 --> 00:08:08 paper that gives you a uh essentially a
00:08:08 --> 00:08:10 scale of intensities that
00:08:10 --> 00:08:13 that refer to the color. So what you're
00:08:13 --> 00:08:16 saying is is um a measure of brightness.
00:08:16 --> 00:08:19 And uh you you're absolutely right that
00:08:19 --> 00:08:21 the the the thing is the same color as
00:08:21 --> 00:08:23 its background, but what delineates it
00:08:23 --> 00:08:27 is this abrupt um kind of step from the
00:08:27 --> 00:08:29 intensity of the marble itself, if I can
00:08:29 --> 00:08:30 call it. That's a really good word
00:08:30 --> 00:08:32 because it looks exactly like that. Uh
00:08:32 --> 00:08:35 the the step in intensity from that to
00:08:35 --> 00:08:37 the background which is which is a lower
00:08:37 --> 00:08:41 intensity. Uh and so it's uh the you
00:08:41 --> 00:08:42 know what we're what we're seeing there
00:08:42 --> 00:08:46 is the radio data interpreted as color.
00:08:46 --> 00:08:49 Uh and the greenish uh is is I think
00:08:49 --> 00:08:51 that's just one that they've chosen for
00:08:51 --> 00:08:54 that level of intensity. That space.com
00:08:54 --> 00:08:57 page that I mentioned earlier has uh
00:08:57 --> 00:08:59 another of it's got the original map the
00:08:59 --> 00:09:02 original radio map I think that um that
00:09:02 --> 00:09:05 uh is the one that Mir used to to find
00:09:05 --> 00:09:07 Telios. And you can see there that the
00:09:07 --> 00:09:09 color is orange. Once again, it's an
00:09:09 --> 00:09:11 artificial color. So, we're not looking
00:09:11 --> 00:09:13 at any anything actually astrophysical
00:09:13 --> 00:09:15 with that color. Yeah. So, it's not
00:09:15 --> 00:09:17 measuring any kind of a like a density
00:09:17 --> 00:09:20 like a like a ultrasound or anything
00:09:20 --> 00:09:21 like that because I do see different
00:09:21 --> 00:09:24 colors around it that I I believe would
00:09:24 --> 00:09:27 be indicating differences in radio
00:09:27 --> 00:09:29 frequencies bouncing off. So for example
00:09:30 --> 00:09:31 that kind of that bright spot in the
00:09:31 --> 00:09:36 left corner is not a bright spot of sun
00:09:36 --> 00:09:38 reflection in the traditional sense of
00:09:38 --> 00:09:40 an image that we would see. What would
00:09:40 --> 00:09:43 that bright spot represent in radio
00:09:43 --> 00:09:48 imaging? Um I it's that is where if I
00:09:48 --> 00:09:49 remember rightly because the article
00:09:49 --> 00:09:50 that I'm looking at doesn't have this
00:09:50 --> 00:09:52 but I did look at the original paper. I
00:09:52 --> 00:09:54 think that's where the visible there is
00:09:54 --> 00:09:57 a little bit of visible uh emission uh
00:09:57 --> 00:09:59 visible light emission uh it's it's the
00:09:59 --> 00:10:03 color that we associate with hydrogen uh
00:10:03 --> 00:10:06 because um we know that you know
00:10:06 --> 00:10:07 different elements emit light in
00:10:08 --> 00:10:09 different colors when they're excited uh
00:10:10 --> 00:10:11 either by ultraviolet light or
00:10:11 --> 00:10:14 electrical particle you know electrified
00:10:14 --> 00:10:17 particles and I think that's where the
00:10:17 --> 00:10:19 uh the visible light color comes in.
00:10:19 --> 00:10:21 You're right. There's a there's a it's
00:10:21 --> 00:10:24 almost like a whitish patch there. So, I
00:10:24 --> 00:10:26 think the greenish stuff is the radio
00:10:26 --> 00:10:28 emission. Um I think you're right, too,
00:10:28 --> 00:10:29 that there are probably different
00:10:29 --> 00:10:31 frequencies depicted here and they too
00:10:31 --> 00:10:33 might change the change the color
00:10:33 --> 00:10:34 because what you can do the same with
00:10:34 --> 00:10:36 radio waves as we do with visible light.
00:10:36 --> 00:10:38 The reason why we see different colors
00:10:38 --> 00:10:39 is that we're seeing different
00:10:39 --> 00:10:41 wavelengths of light. So what you can do
00:10:41 --> 00:10:43 with radio radiation, you've got these
00:10:43 --> 00:10:45 receivers which are basically giving you
00:10:45 --> 00:10:48 different frequencies of radio uh radio
00:10:48 --> 00:10:51 waves and you can assign colors to them
00:10:51 --> 00:10:52 and make an image like this. I think
00:10:52 --> 00:10:55 that's probably what's happened. Okay,
00:10:55 --> 00:10:57 that makes that makes a lot of sense. Um
00:10:57 --> 00:10:59 I I also kind of asked that this is a
00:10:59 --> 00:11:00 little bit funny, but I found a comment
00:11:00 --> 00:11:02 on that article from a conspiracy
00:11:02 --> 00:11:06 theorist who is claiming that this is
00:11:06 --> 00:11:10 undoubtedly um an altered that. So he
00:11:10 --> 00:11:12 thinks it's a telescope image and he
00:11:12 --> 00:11:14 thinks that they have altered the lens
00:11:14 --> 00:11:17 to hide intelligent life that's hiding
00:11:17 --> 00:11:20 behind that spot. And so I think that's
00:11:20 --> 00:11:22 why sometimes it is just so important
00:11:22 --> 00:11:24 for people who don't understand the
00:11:24 --> 00:11:27 science to take a step back and just go,
00:11:27 --> 00:11:28 okay, you know, first of all, this is
00:11:28 --> 00:11:30 not a telescope image we're looking at.
00:11:30 --> 00:11:34 This is a sound radio frequency
00:11:34 --> 00:11:37 translated to a visual medium for us to
00:11:37 --> 00:11:39 be able to understand what those waves
00:11:39 --> 00:11:42 meant. And then for somebody who doesn't
00:11:42 --> 00:11:45 understand what that
00:11:45 --> 00:11:47 means, they can maybe I don't know jump
00:11:48 --> 00:11:49 to some crazy conclusions. So at the end
00:11:49 --> 00:11:51 of the day, it's always so important to
00:11:51 --> 00:11:54 understand how we're getting what we're
00:11:54 --> 00:11:55 looking at and then what we're looking
00:11:55 --> 00:11:57 at even means. So thank you for
00:11:57 --> 00:11:59 clarifying that.
00:11:59 --> 00:12:01 It it does um you know, it's interesting
00:12:01 --> 00:12:03 that you mentioned conspiracy theorist
00:12:03 --> 00:12:05 because it does have such a perfect
00:12:05 --> 00:12:07 circular feature that it looks
00:12:07 --> 00:12:09 artificial and it's not. It's definitely
00:12:09 --> 00:12:11 a supernova remnant, one of these
00:12:11 --> 00:12:14 bubbles. Uh, but yes, it does look like
00:12:14 --> 00:12:15 something that's been made by
00:12:15 --> 00:12:18 intelligent life. But, uh, we don't
00:12:18 --> 00:12:21 believe it has. Well, you know, those
00:12:21 --> 00:12:23 pancakes also look pretty circular.
00:12:23 --> 00:12:26 Maybe this is a theme in space. I Does
00:12:26 --> 00:12:29 space like circles?
00:12:29 --> 00:12:31 Uh, it does, actually. And, uh, you've
00:12:31 --> 00:12:33 hit the nail on the head, Heidi, because
00:12:33 --> 00:12:35 we've got three stories today that all
00:12:35 --> 00:12:38 involve circles. And this one is no uh
00:12:38 --> 00:12:40 no less spectacular actually than the
00:12:40 --> 00:12:44 previous one. Uh so we we were talking
00:12:44 --> 00:12:47 about very very regular circular
00:12:48 --> 00:12:51 features on the planet Venus. Uh and
00:12:51 --> 00:12:53 Venus as I guess most of our listeners
00:12:53 --> 00:12:56 know Heidi is surrounded by a thick
00:12:56 --> 00:12:59 opaque atmosphere. Uh that means that we
00:12:59 --> 00:13:01 cannot penetrate it very easily.
00:13:01 --> 00:13:04 Although I should say that um one of the
00:13:04 --> 00:13:06 uh one of the outstanding features of
00:13:06 --> 00:13:08 the Anglo Australian telescope, the
00:13:08 --> 00:13:09 telescope that I used to be the
00:13:09 --> 00:13:11 astronomer in charge of very early in
00:13:11 --> 00:13:13 its history, it actually saw the surface
00:13:13 --> 00:13:15 of Venus through those clouds using
00:13:15 --> 00:13:18 infrared radiation. Uh only a glimpse,
00:13:18 --> 00:13:20 but it did see enough of the surface.
00:13:20 --> 00:13:22 But the best way to see the surface of
00:13:22 --> 00:13:24 Venus, unless you land a spacecraft on
00:13:24 --> 00:13:26 it, which the former Soviet Union did a
00:13:26 --> 00:13:29 number of times in the 1980s, um, and
00:13:30 --> 00:13:31 sent us back some pictures of the
00:13:31 --> 00:13:34 surface, but the best way to see it, uh,
00:13:34 --> 00:13:37 from above is by radar. And NASA's
00:13:37 --> 00:13:41 Mellan spacecraft, uh, back in the 1990s
00:13:41 --> 00:13:44 mapped the whole of Venus's surface uh,
00:13:44 --> 00:13:46 with radar. And so we've effectively got
00:13:46 --> 00:13:49 very clear images, quite high resolution
00:13:49 --> 00:13:51 images of the surface of Venus, uh,
00:13:51 --> 00:13:54 which show mountains and valleys and and
00:13:54 --> 00:13:58 yes, volcanoes, but they also show these
00:13:58 --> 00:14:01 really weird features, the ones that are
00:14:01 --> 00:14:02 very very circular. They're called
00:14:02 --> 00:14:06 pancake domes. Uh, and they they
00:14:06 --> 00:14:10 actually look more like impact craters.
00:14:10 --> 00:14:11 Those craters that we're so familiar
00:14:11 --> 00:14:15 with on the moon where um meteorites and
00:14:15 --> 00:14:17 small asteroids the same thing. Yeah.
00:14:17 --> 00:14:20 Yeah. Landed. Uh, but they're not. They
00:14:20 --> 00:14:23 apparently are tectonic features. They
00:14:23 --> 00:14:27 come from volcanism in the planet. Um,
00:14:27 --> 00:14:29 they do look just like pancakes. I have
00:14:29 --> 00:14:32 to say they really do. They almost like
00:14:32 --> 00:14:34 with the crust and everything like they
00:14:34 --> 00:14:36 just like the pancake that was just
00:14:36 --> 00:14:38 cooked. Maybe you were supposed to take
00:14:38 --> 00:14:41 it off the stove just a minute before.
00:14:41 --> 00:14:42 That's That's probably right. Yes. Just
00:14:42 --> 00:14:44 before the edge started turning up,
00:14:44 --> 00:14:48 which has happened there. Um that so so
00:14:48 --> 00:14:52 they're not volcanoes in the way that we
00:14:52 --> 00:14:53 normally think of one that the common
00:14:53 --> 00:14:55 volcanoes that we think of here on Earth
00:14:55 --> 00:14:57 are strata volcanoes, the ones that look
00:14:57 --> 00:14:59 like Mount Vuvius, very conical. Or
00:14:59 --> 00:15:01 we've got the shield volcanoes like
00:15:01 --> 00:15:04 Manuka on Hawaii which are they're
00:15:04 --> 00:15:05 called shield volcanoes because they
00:15:05 --> 00:15:08 look like a shield. They're flat uh and
00:15:08 --> 00:15:11 and with only gentle slopes rather than
00:15:11 --> 00:15:13 having you know very very steep sides.
00:15:13 --> 00:15:16 But these are quite different uh pancake
00:15:16 --> 00:15:20 domes. And um the
00:15:20 --> 00:15:23 the reason why they're in the news is
00:15:23 --> 00:15:26 that we've never really understood how
00:15:26 --> 00:15:28 they're formed. It's thought that it is
00:15:28 --> 00:15:31 something to do with pressure underneath
00:15:31 --> 00:15:35 the crust of uh Venus. And we we see
00:15:35 --> 00:15:38 these domes, volcanic domes on other
00:15:38 --> 00:15:40 worlds in the solar system. And I'm
00:15:40 --> 00:15:42 thinking particularly of series, which
00:15:42 --> 00:15:44 is the largest of the asteroid. It's
00:15:44 --> 00:15:46 asteroid. It's actually a dwarf planet
00:15:46 --> 00:15:50 uh 900 kilometers across. Series has um
00:15:50 --> 00:15:52 regions that look as though they should
00:15:52 --> 00:15:54 be a volcano, but there's no crater at
00:15:54 --> 00:15:56 the top. And what we're seeing is the
00:15:56 --> 00:15:58 something underneath underneath the
00:15:58 --> 00:16:01 crust of series has welled up uh and the
00:16:01 --> 00:16:04 pressure has caused this elevation of
00:16:04 --> 00:16:07 the landscape. So it pushes up this this
00:16:07 --> 00:16:10 weird looking dome. Uh and um that
00:16:10 --> 00:16:13 however is quite different from what
00:16:13 --> 00:16:16 we're seeing on Venus as which our
00:16:16 --> 00:16:17 listeners are probably fed up of hearing
00:16:17 --> 00:16:20 now. They look like pancakes. And so the
00:16:20 --> 00:16:22 problem has been how are these things
00:16:22 --> 00:16:25 formed? And one of them has been studied
00:16:25 --> 00:16:27 in detail. It's one of the largest of
00:16:27 --> 00:16:30 them. It's 90 mi or 145 kilometers in
00:16:30 --> 00:16:33 diameter. And again, it uses um that
00:16:33 --> 00:16:36 those radar data that we spoke about. So
00:16:36 --> 00:16:39 a group of scientists
00:16:39 --> 00:16:41 um I think they're led from the Georgia
00:16:41 --> 00:16:44 Institute of Technology in the USA. uh
00:16:44 --> 00:16:48 are they've looked at theoretical models
00:16:48 --> 00:16:50 as to what you would need to produce
00:16:50 --> 00:16:53 such a curious feature on the surface of
00:16:53 --> 00:16:56 a planet like Venus and they actually
00:16:56 --> 00:17:00 have an answer. Um they say okay it's a
00:17:00 --> 00:17:04 particular kind of lava that you need
00:17:04 --> 00:17:08 coupled with a a a surface a um a a a
00:17:08 --> 00:17:12 crust of Venus which is particularly
00:17:12 --> 00:17:14 pliable. In other words, it's flexible.
00:17:14 --> 00:17:16 And in fact, we've seen other reports
00:17:16 --> 00:17:19 recently that suggest that the crust of
00:17:19 --> 00:17:21 Venus is not as rigid as the Earth's
00:17:21 --> 00:17:23 crust. That it is a bit more flexible.
00:17:23 --> 00:17:25 And now it's still pretty stiff compared
00:17:25 --> 00:17:26 with the kind of things, you know,
00:17:26 --> 00:17:28 bending a piece of paper or something
00:17:28 --> 00:17:31 like that, but it's nevertheless um uh
00:17:31 --> 00:17:33 more flexible than our crust is. So the
00:17:33 --> 00:17:35 numbers that they come up with are
00:17:35 --> 00:17:38 pretty spectacular. uh they need a very
00:17:38 --> 00:17:43 very viscous lava and um the u report
00:17:43 --> 00:17:46 that uh that I've read um which is an
00:17:46 --> 00:17:48 article by Ashley Morgan on Daily Galaxy
00:17:48 --> 00:17:50 uh describes it as being a trillion
00:17:50 --> 00:17:53 times thicker than ketchup and twice as
00:17:53 --> 00:17:56 dense as water. What is up with all the
00:17:56 --> 00:17:58 food references?
00:17:58 --> 00:18:00 We're doing pretty well with the bubbles
00:18:00 --> 00:18:01 and the pancakes and all the rest of it.
00:18:02 --> 00:18:04 Anyway, that what that means is you've
00:18:04 --> 00:18:07 got a lava that is very very slow
00:18:07 --> 00:18:11 flowing. Um not you know as we see
00:18:11 --> 00:18:12 volcanoes on earth where the lava's
00:18:12 --> 00:18:15 pouring down the down the mountain side.
00:18:15 --> 00:18:19 Uh we these um actually move very slowly
00:18:19 --> 00:18:21 hundreds of thousands of years to form a
00:18:21 --> 00:18:24 phenomenon like this. Uh and if you mix
00:18:24 --> 00:18:28 that with the uh with the fact that the
00:18:28 --> 00:18:31 crust is flexible, then you get a model
00:18:32 --> 00:18:35 that actually is capable of simulating
00:18:35 --> 00:18:39 these pancake features. Uh and that's
00:18:39 --> 00:18:40 quite extraordinary that you can just do
00:18:40 --> 00:18:42 that, you know, with with computer
00:18:42 --> 00:18:45 modeling. Uh but you can actually uh
00:18:45 --> 00:18:47 make something in the computer that
00:18:47 --> 00:18:50 matches what we see exactly. And so that
00:18:50 --> 00:18:53 is why uh we think that's the you know
00:18:53 --> 00:18:54 it's the new idea for the way these
00:18:54 --> 00:18:57 things formed. Very very different from
00:18:57 --> 00:19:00 the way features on our own planet form.
00:19:00 --> 00:19:03 Well and almost like you know I'm I'm
00:19:03 --> 00:19:05 sorry I'm beating the dead horse but if
00:19:05 --> 00:19:10 this was dough we we see how if the
00:19:10 --> 00:19:14 dough had risen and it was almost
00:19:14 --> 00:19:17 liquidy and that bubble kind of popped
00:19:17 --> 00:19:19 and then it softened back down. you see
00:19:19 --> 00:19:22 the same kind of lines and dimples that
00:19:22 --> 00:19:24 you would see on a cupcake that went
00:19:24 --> 00:19:26 flat or something like that. So, it
00:19:26 --> 00:19:29 really I mean their line of logic makes
00:19:29 --> 00:19:32 perfect sense for even me who has no um
00:19:32 --> 00:19:34 geological background. So, that's really
00:19:34 --> 00:19:36 quite interesting.
00:19:36 --> 00:19:39 Uh yes, I agree. Um and you know, I
00:19:39 --> 00:19:42 think um what you what you've described
00:19:42 --> 00:19:44 uh actually is probably a good model for
00:19:44 --> 00:19:46 the way these things formed. I suspect
00:19:46 --> 00:19:49 that what we're seeing uh as the surface
00:19:49 --> 00:19:51 of these things is actually the crust of
00:19:51 --> 00:19:53 Venus which has been deformed into this
00:19:53 --> 00:19:55 shape by the pressure underneath of this
00:19:55 --> 00:19:58 very very slow flowing magma. So if you
00:19:58 --> 00:20:02 do take the analog of the the cookery um
00:20:02 --> 00:20:03 something's gone really terribly wrong
00:20:03 --> 00:20:06 with your cupcakes.
00:20:06 --> 00:20:10 And that's just uh the the recipe for a
00:20:10 --> 00:20:11 perfect planet. You can't leave it in
00:20:12 --> 00:20:14 the oven too long. You can't let it cool
00:20:14 --> 00:20:16 too much. If it's if it's too hot, it'll
00:20:16 --> 00:20:17 be Venus. If it's too cold, it'll be
00:20:17 --> 00:20:21 Mars. Our planet is cooked to
00:20:21 --> 00:20:25 perfection. Our planet is the sule of
00:20:25 --> 00:20:27 planets. Let's take a little break from
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00:23:46 --> 00:23:48 spaceenuts. and we'll have all that
00:23:48 --> 00:23:51 information in the show notes. Now, back
00:23:51 --> 00:23:54 to the show.
00:23:54 --> 00:23:57 Space nuts. Well, pivoting away from
00:23:57 --> 00:23:59 food references, now that everyone is
00:23:59 --> 00:24:02 hungry, I am so sorry, but we are going
00:24:02 --> 00:24:05 to talk about the European Space Ay's
00:24:05 --> 00:24:07 50-year
00:24:07 --> 00:24:09 anniversary special coins. And if any of
00:24:10 --> 00:24:11 you have ever been
00:24:11 --> 00:24:15 around coin collectors, military people
00:24:15 --> 00:24:18 who have worked in government type
00:24:18 --> 00:24:23 roles, coin collecting can be quite the
00:24:23 --> 00:24:25 hobby that people get really, really
00:24:25 --> 00:24:28 into. And going to different places,
00:24:28 --> 00:24:29 different organizations, collecting
00:24:29 --> 00:24:32 these rare coins is something that I
00:24:32 --> 00:24:34 think for some it becomes quite an
00:24:34 --> 00:24:36 obsession. So, this is actually a pretty
00:24:36 --> 00:24:38 exciting story, Fred, and I'm glad that
00:24:38 --> 00:24:41 we're talking about it. Um, because it's
00:24:41 --> 00:24:43 not what's going on in space, but it's
00:24:43 --> 00:24:48 how we humans are relating to space. You
00:24:48 --> 00:24:49 sound almost as though you're speaking
00:24:49 --> 00:24:51 from personal experience there, Heidi,
00:24:51 --> 00:24:54 about um obsessive coin collectors. I'm
00:24:54 --> 00:24:56 not the obsessive coin collector, but I
00:24:56 --> 00:24:59 might know a few. Yes, that's where I
00:24:59 --> 00:25:02 was wondering. Um, it's true. It's
00:25:02 --> 00:25:04 actually uh I think it's a pretty good
00:25:04 --> 00:25:07 hobby as well if you're you know it's
00:25:07 --> 00:25:09 some very nice things to display and
00:25:09 --> 00:25:11 people do indeed take it very seriously
00:25:11 --> 00:25:13 indeed. So what this story is about is
00:25:14 --> 00:25:17 well more circles uh not so much the
00:25:17 --> 00:25:20 coins although they are spectacularly
00:25:20 --> 00:25:23 beautiful and um it's not too hard to
00:25:23 --> 00:25:26 find online what these coins look like
00:25:26 --> 00:25:27 but the anniversary that they're
00:25:28 --> 00:25:29 celebrating. So let's cut to the chase.
00:25:29 --> 00:25:32 It's the Royal Mint of Belgium and the
00:25:32 --> 00:25:34 Royal Dutch Mint uh that have struck
00:25:34 --> 00:25:37 these new coins. They're in euros, of
00:25:37 --> 00:25:40 course, the currency of Europe. Uh one
00:25:40 --> 00:25:45 is a 2 and a half uh two 250 coin. Uh
00:25:45 --> 00:25:49 and the other one is a 50 cent coin. Uh
00:25:49 --> 00:25:53 and they are both emlazed with the logo
00:25:53 --> 00:25:57 of the European Space Agency. uh which
00:25:57 --> 00:26:00 is celebrating this year uh 50 years
00:26:00 --> 00:26:04 since its inauguration on May the 30th,
00:26:04 --> 00:26:07 1975. Uh I remember it well actually
00:26:07 --> 00:26:11 Heidi because uh there were two
00:26:11 --> 00:26:13 precursor organizations which we used to
00:26:14 --> 00:26:16 hear a lot about in the 1960s and 70s.
00:26:16 --> 00:26:19 Of course, the headline headlines were
00:26:19 --> 00:26:21 always being made by NASA with the
00:26:22 --> 00:26:25 Apollo program uh and its predecessors
00:26:25 --> 00:26:28 uh Mercury and Geminy. Uh those programs
00:26:28 --> 00:26:31 were what we lived and breathed actually
00:26:31 --> 00:26:33 at the time, those of us who were space
00:26:33 --> 00:26:36 fanatics. But the Europeans had two
00:26:36 --> 00:26:39 organizations which were called Eldo and
00:26:39 --> 00:26:42 Ezro. Aldo was the European Launcher
00:26:42 --> 00:26:44 Development Organization and Ezra was
00:26:44 --> 00:26:47 the European Space Research Organization
00:26:47 --> 00:26:49 and if I remember rightly the United
00:26:49 --> 00:26:51 Kingdom where I grew up was in one of
00:26:51 --> 00:26:53 them and I can't remember which one it
00:26:53 --> 00:26:55 was and I don't think it was in the
00:26:55 --> 00:26:57 other. I think it might have been Ezra.
00:26:57 --> 00:27:01 Um uh it's uh I was at um not very long
00:27:01 --> 00:27:03 ago last year I was at a place called
00:27:03 --> 00:27:06 Woomer in South Australia which was
00:27:06 --> 00:27:08 another name that was very familiar to
00:27:08 --> 00:27:11 all of us space geeks in the 50s60s and
00:27:11 --> 00:27:14 70s because that was where uh British
00:27:14 --> 00:27:16 rocket experiments took place. It's a
00:27:16 --> 00:27:19 very barren part of Australia although
00:27:19 --> 00:27:21 there are traditional owners who live
00:27:21 --> 00:27:24 there. Uh and many rockets uh tests were
00:27:24 --> 00:27:27 carried out there. Um most of them
00:27:27 --> 00:27:32 ceased in the in the 1990s early 2000s
00:27:32 --> 00:27:34 although there's now new work going on.
00:27:34 --> 00:27:38 Uh but um uh I was had a chance to visit
00:27:38 --> 00:27:40 it last year and there's a fabulous
00:27:40 --> 00:27:42 museum there with all these
00:27:42 --> 00:27:45 nu all these 20th century rocket
00:27:45 --> 00:27:48 examples. But there is an Eldo hotel.
00:27:48 --> 00:27:50 It's called the Eldo Hotel and it comes
00:27:50 --> 00:27:52 from the European Launcher Development
00:27:52 --> 00:27:55 Organization. So, uh, that was it's a
00:27:55 --> 00:27:57 name that probably most people these
00:27:57 --> 00:28:00 days wouldn't recognize, but Eldo was
00:28:00 --> 00:28:03 that, um, very important organization
00:28:03 --> 00:28:05 which eventually, uh, melded with the
00:28:05 --> 00:28:07 European Space Research Organization to
00:28:07 --> 00:28:09 become ESO. I beg you pardon. It became
00:28:09 --> 00:28:11 ISO. ISO is the European Southern
00:28:11 --> 00:28:13 Observatory. ISO is the European Space
00:28:13 --> 00:28:15 Agency, which is what these two
00:28:15 --> 00:28:17 organizations turned into. 50th
00:28:17 --> 00:28:19 anniversary.Sa ISA has done an
00:28:19 --> 00:28:21 extraordinary job over the past 50 years
00:28:21 --> 00:28:23 working a lot with other agencies most
00:28:24 --> 00:28:26 especially with NASA of course issa is a
00:28:26 --> 00:28:29 partner in the international space
00:28:29 --> 00:28:33 station uh and uh it's um very very
00:28:33 --> 00:28:36 capable indeed in terms of the um not
00:28:36 --> 00:28:38 just the human spaceflight missions that
00:28:38 --> 00:28:40 it has been involved with but also the
00:28:40 --> 00:28:44 robotic missions um uh dier just to
00:28:44 --> 00:28:46 bring one to mind which is a very
00:28:46 --> 00:28:48 important astrology military satellite,
00:28:48 --> 00:28:50 a satellite measuring the positions of
00:28:50 --> 00:28:53 stars very accurately. That was an issa
00:28:53 --> 00:28:55 project. Uh in fact, there was an issa
00:28:55 --> 00:28:59 uh lander that went to Titan with uh
00:28:59 --> 00:29:02 NASA's Cassini spacecraft and uh that
00:29:02 --> 00:29:04 lander which was called Huygens that
00:29:04 --> 00:29:06 landed on the surface of of Titan that
00:29:06 --> 00:29:09 was an issa spacecraft and many many
00:29:09 --> 00:29:12 more. Uh I could go on but I won't
00:29:12 --> 00:29:15 because uh the bottom line is that ISA
00:29:15 --> 00:29:17 is a very productive organization and
00:29:17 --> 00:29:18 we're now celebrating with these two
00:29:18 --> 00:29:20 lovely coins.
00:29:20 --> 00:29:24 So Fred, I wanted to ask you if you knew
00:29:24 --> 00:29:27 I have the coins pulled up on a big
00:29:27 --> 00:29:28 screen right now and I'm looking at the
00:29:28 --> 00:29:32 design and the design looks significant.
00:29:32 --> 00:29:34 Um, I don't know if you can see it, but
00:29:34 --> 00:29:36 there's the side where it has the
00:29:36 --> 00:29:38 50-year anniversary and then it looks
00:29:38 --> 00:29:39 like a
00:29:39 --> 00:29:42 star spinning around on some kind of an
00:29:42 --> 00:29:44 orbit. And then the other the other side
00:29:44 --> 00:29:47 of the coin, the where it has the two
00:29:47 --> 00:29:48 and a half year, obviously Europe, I
00:29:48 --> 00:29:51 recognize that. But the lines on the
00:29:51 --> 00:29:54 left, correct me if I'm wrong, was that
00:29:54 --> 00:29:56 from
00:29:56 --> 00:29:58 Voyager? Are you seeing what I'm seeing?
00:29:58 --> 00:30:00 Yes, I am seeing it. I can see what you
00:30:00 --> 00:30:02 mean. Uh they may be
00:30:03 --> 00:30:06 um uh it may
00:30:06 --> 00:30:09 be they they look like the ones that I'm
00:30:09 --> 00:30:11 thinking of are on on the Pioneer
00:30:11 --> 00:30:14 spacecraft where they drew lines on it
00:30:14 --> 00:30:16 to show where it had come from in
00:30:16 --> 00:30:19 relation to quaazars in the sky and it
00:30:19 --> 00:30:21 may be something like that. I can't
00:30:21 --> 00:30:24 quite make out enough detail just to
00:30:24 --> 00:30:25 know what they're depicting there. But
00:30:26 --> 00:30:28 it does look something like it, doesn't
00:30:28 --> 00:30:32 it? Very like the pioneer plaque.
00:30:32 --> 00:30:34 Very much so. Yeah. Well, here's a
00:30:34 --> 00:30:36 serious scavenger hunt then for our
00:30:36 --> 00:30:39 listeners. You guys can see if you can
00:30:39 --> 00:30:43 figure out what the puzzle is on these
00:30:43 --> 00:30:46 coins and then write back to us or
00:30:46 --> 00:30:48 comment on our social media and let us
00:30:48 --> 00:30:52 know what you think the lines mean. I'm
00:30:52 --> 00:30:54 going with Voyager.
00:30:54 --> 00:30:57 Okay, go for it. There's a there's a
00:30:57 --> 00:31:00 symbol there as well which is underneath
00:31:00 --> 00:31:02 the date. I don't know what we're seeing
00:31:02 --> 00:31:04 there. It almost looks like spacecraft.
00:31:04 --> 00:31:06 It looks like I don't know. I'm trying
00:31:06 --> 00:31:07 to figure that out, too. It looks like a
00:31:07 --> 00:31:10 sea shell on the left and then like the
00:31:10 --> 00:31:13 medical medical symbol on the right.
00:31:13 --> 00:31:15 Yeah, maybe. Maybe. Well, there must be
00:31:15 --> 00:31:17 an answer to that, which hopefully we'll
00:31:17 --> 00:31:21 discover uh on a later edition of Space
00:31:21 --> 00:31:24 Notes. Absolutely. Well, thank you. What
00:31:24 --> 00:31:26 a cliffhanger to leave this episode off
00:31:26 --> 00:31:28 on. You guys uh have to go put on your
00:31:28 --> 00:31:30 detective hats. And while Fred is
00:31:30 --> 00:31:32 exploring the mysteries of the universe,
00:31:32 --> 00:31:34 we can all be exploring the mysteries on
00:31:34 --> 00:31:35 this coin.
00:31:36 --> 00:31:38 But thank you so much for everybody who
00:31:38 --> 00:31:40 has joined us for another episode of
00:31:40 --> 00:31:43 Space Nuts and we will be seeing you
00:31:43 --> 00:31:47 guys next week. See you later, Fred.
00:31:47 --> 00:31:49 Thanks again, Heidi. Take care. Space
00:31:49 --> 00:31:51 nuts. You'll be listening to the Space
00:31:51 --> 00:31:54 Nuts podcast
00:31:54 --> 00:31:57 available at Apple Podcasts, Spotify,
00:31:57 --> 00:32:00 iHeart Radio, or your favorite podcast
00:32:00 --> 00:32:02 player. You can also stream on demand at
00:32:02 --> 00:32:05 byes.com. This has been another quality
00:32:05 --> 00:32:09 podcast production from sites.com.