00:00:00 --> 00:00:01 Hey there, space enthusiasts, and
00:00:01 --> 00:00:03 welcome to Astronomy Daily. I'm your
00:00:03 --> 00:00:05 host, Anna, and I'm super excited to
00:00:05 --> 00:00:07 bring you the latest cosmic happenings.
00:00:07 --> 00:00:09 Today, we're diving into a mixed bag of
00:00:09 --> 00:00:12 news from a Japanese lunar lander that
00:00:12 --> 00:00:14 uh didn't quite stick the landing to a
00:00:14 --> 00:00:17 very public spat between Elon Musk and
00:00:17 --> 00:00:20 well, you know, we'll also be taking a
00:00:20 --> 00:00:21 look at what a maze is doing on Mars.
00:00:22 --> 00:00:24 And get this, the biggest explosion
00:00:24 --> 00:00:26 scientists have seen since the Big Bang.
00:00:26 --> 00:00:30 So, buckle up and let's get started.
00:00:30 --> 00:00:32 So, first up, we have some updated news
00:00:32 --> 00:00:35 from Icepace, the Japan-based company,
00:00:35 --> 00:00:37 and uh well, it's not great. Their
00:00:37 --> 00:00:39 Resilience lander, unfortunately, didn't
00:00:39 --> 00:00:41 exactly nail its landing on the moon.
00:00:42 --> 00:00:43 Yeah, it seems they got to the finish
00:00:43 --> 00:00:45 line, but uh weren't quite successful in
00:00:45 --> 00:00:48 sticking the landing. Now, this mission
00:00:48 --> 00:00:50 launched about 4 and a half months ago
00:00:50 --> 00:00:53 on a Falcon 9 rocket from Cape Canaveral
00:00:53 --> 00:00:55 as part of a ride share with Firefly
00:00:55 --> 00:00:58 Aerospace's Blue Ghost Lander. The teams
00:00:58 --> 00:01:01 in Japan announced that sadly they lost
00:01:01 --> 00:01:03 communication with Resilience, which
00:01:03 --> 00:01:04 probably means it suffered a hard
00:01:04 --> 00:01:08 landing. Ouch. Takkeshi Hakamada, the
00:01:08 --> 00:01:11 founder and CEO of Ispace, said that
00:01:11 --> 00:01:13 their top priority is to analyze the
00:01:13 --> 00:01:15 telemetry data they managed to get and
00:01:15 --> 00:01:17 figure out what went wrong. They're
00:01:17 --> 00:01:19 aiming to restore trust by providing a
00:01:19 --> 00:01:22 report to everyone involved. The mission
00:01:22 --> 00:01:24 actually seemed to be going smoothly at
00:01:24 --> 00:01:26 first. Resilience went through several
00:01:26 --> 00:01:29 phases, gradually lowering its orbit
00:01:29 --> 00:01:31 around the moon. But after it reached
00:01:31 --> 00:01:34 about 20 km above the surface, things
00:01:34 --> 00:01:37 went south. They lost telemetry and
00:01:37 --> 00:01:39 based on the data they have, the lander
00:01:39 --> 00:01:41 couldn't decelerate enough and it well
00:01:41 --> 00:01:43 crash landed. This lander was carrying
00:01:44 --> 00:01:46 science payloads and even a rover from
00:01:46 --> 00:01:49 space Europe named Tenacious. The plan
00:01:49 --> 00:01:51 was to land in a region called Mary
00:01:51 --> 00:01:54 Fragorus or the Sea of Cold. There was
00:01:54 --> 00:01:56 even a small model of a Swedish house on
00:01:56 --> 00:01:57 board meant to be placed on the moon by
00:01:57 --> 00:02:00 the rover. Now, this is iSpace's second
00:02:00 --> 00:02:02 landing failure in two missions, but
00:02:02 --> 00:02:05 their American subsidiary, iSpace US, is
00:02:05 --> 00:02:07 still on contract with NASA for a
00:02:07 --> 00:02:10 mission in 2027 to deliver a larger
00:02:10 --> 00:02:13 lander to the far side of the moon. So,
00:02:13 --> 00:02:14 hopefully they'll be able to turn things
00:02:14 --> 00:02:16 around.
00:02:16 --> 00:02:19 Okay, next up we've got a bit of a uh
00:02:19 --> 00:02:21 well, let's call it a situation brewing
00:02:21 --> 00:02:23 between Elon Musk and Donald Trump.
00:02:24 --> 00:02:25 Yeah, you heard that right. So,
00:02:25 --> 00:02:27 apparently these two aren't exactly
00:02:27 --> 00:02:29 seeing eye to eye anymore after Musk
00:02:29 --> 00:02:31 served as a special government employee
00:02:31 --> 00:02:32 leading the Department of Government
00:02:32 --> 00:02:36 Efficiency or Doge. Things seemed fine.
00:02:36 --> 00:02:38 Trump even called Musk one of the
00:02:38 --> 00:02:40 greatest business leaders and innovators
00:02:40 --> 00:02:43 the world has ever produced. But things
00:02:43 --> 00:02:45 went downhill after Musk criticized
00:02:45 --> 00:02:47 Trump's big, beautiful bill. Trump fired
00:02:48 --> 00:02:49 back, suggesting the US could save money
00:02:49 --> 00:02:51 by canceling government contracts with
00:02:51 --> 00:02:53 Musk's companies. And that's when things
00:02:53 --> 00:02:56 got spicy. Musk responded with a threat
00:02:56 --> 00:02:58 to begin decommissioning SpaceX's Dragon
00:02:58 --> 00:03:00 spacecraft
00:03:00 --> 00:03:02 immediately. Now, if Musk is serious,
00:03:02 --> 00:03:04 this could have some pretty big
00:03:04 --> 00:03:06 consequences for American space flight.
00:03:06 --> 00:03:09 I mean, think about it. SpaceX's Dragon
00:03:09 --> 00:03:11 spacecraft have been crucial for NASA
00:03:11 --> 00:03:13 operations on the International Space
00:03:13 --> 00:03:16 Station, ushering in a new era of US
00:03:16 --> 00:03:18 space flight. If Dragon gets
00:03:18 --> 00:03:20 decommissioned, that would basically end
00:03:20 --> 00:03:22 US-based astronaut launches for a while.
00:03:22 --> 00:03:24 And Boeing's Starlininer isn't quite
00:03:24 --> 00:03:27 ready to fill that gap yet. SpaceX has
00:03:27 --> 00:03:29 some pretty substantial government
00:03:29 --> 00:03:31 contracts, including NASA's commercial
00:03:31 --> 00:03:33 crew program, cargo resupply services
00:03:34 --> 00:03:37 for the ISS, and oh yeah, they're
00:03:37 --> 00:03:38 supposed to provide the lunar lander for
00:03:38 --> 00:03:41 NASA's Aremis Moon program. So, if those
00:03:41 --> 00:03:43 contracts get cancelled along with the
00:03:43 --> 00:03:45 proposed cuts to NASA's budget, it could
00:03:46 --> 00:03:48 seriously impact NASA as we know it.
00:03:48 --> 00:03:50 Now, it's not clear what this would mean
00:03:50 --> 00:03:52 for SpaceX's private space flight
00:03:52 --> 00:03:54 endeavors. Axiom Space is about to
00:03:54 --> 00:03:56 launch its fourth private astronaut
00:03:56 --> 00:03:58 mission on a brand new Dragon, and
00:03:58 --> 00:04:00 SpaceX has been doing some cool stuff
00:04:00 --> 00:04:02 with private spacew walks and polar
00:04:02 --> 00:04:04 orbits. NASA's being pretty tight-
00:04:04 --> 00:04:06 lipped about the whole situation, saying
00:04:06 --> 00:04:08 they'll continue to execute the
00:04:08 --> 00:04:09 president's vision for the future of
00:04:09 --> 00:04:11 space. So, we'll have to wait and see
00:04:12 --> 00:04:14 how this all plays out. But, uh, yeah,
00:04:14 --> 00:04:15 stay tuned, folks, because this could
00:04:15 --> 00:04:17 get
00:04:17 --> 00:04:19 interesting. All right, let's move on to
00:04:19 --> 00:04:21 something a little less dramatic. Have
00:04:21 --> 00:04:23 you ever looked at the raw images from
00:04:23 --> 00:04:25 NASA's Perseverance rover and wondered
00:04:25 --> 00:04:27 why it keeps snapping pics of this weird
00:04:27 --> 00:04:30 tiny maze? Well, it turns out there's a
00:04:30 --> 00:04:32 pretty cool reason. That maze is
00:04:32 --> 00:04:34 actually a calibration target, one of 10
00:04:34 --> 00:04:37 for Perseverance's Sherlock instrument.
00:04:37 --> 00:04:38 Yeah, that's short for scanning
00:04:38 --> 00:04:39 habitable environments with ramen and
00:04:40 --> 00:04:42 luminescence for organics and chemicals.
00:04:42 --> 00:04:44 Catchy, right? So Sherlock is basically
00:04:44 --> 00:04:47 a Sherlock Holmes inspired tool designed
00:04:47 --> 00:04:49 to detect organic compounds and other
00:04:49 --> 00:04:51 minerals on Mars that could indicate
00:04:51 --> 00:04:53 signs of, you know, ancient microbial
00:04:53 --> 00:04:55 life. But to do that accurately, it
00:04:55 --> 00:04:56 needs to be carefully calibrated. And
00:04:56 --> 00:04:59 that's where our little maze comes in.
00:04:59 --> 00:05:00 Sherlock is located on the rover's
00:05:00 --> 00:05:03 robotic arm and uses spectroscopic
00:05:03 --> 00:05:05 techniques to analyze Martian rocks. To
00:05:05 --> 00:05:07 make sure its measurements are spot-on,
00:05:07 --> 00:05:09 it routinely calibrates its tools using
00:05:09 --> 00:05:11 reference materials with specific
00:05:11 --> 00:05:13 properties. These are mounted on a plate
00:05:13 --> 00:05:15 attached to the front of the rover's
00:05:15 --> 00:05:16 body, which is called the Sherlock
00:05:16 --> 00:05:19 Calibration target. The maze helps
00:05:19 --> 00:05:21 calibrate the positioning of the laser
00:05:21 --> 00:05:23 scanner mirror and characterizes the
00:05:23 --> 00:05:26 laser's focus. It's made of chromeplated
00:05:26 --> 00:05:28 lines that are super thin, only about
00:05:28 --> 00:05:30 twice the width of a human hair, printed
00:05:30 --> 00:05:33 onto silica glass. And get this, if you
00:05:33 --> 00:05:35 look closely, there's even a tiny
00:05:35 --> 00:05:37 Sherlock Holmes portrait right in the
00:05:37 --> 00:05:39 center. How cool is that? The
00:05:39 --> 00:05:41 calibration target also includes samples
00:05:41 --> 00:05:43 of materials used in space suits like
00:05:43 --> 00:05:47 Teflon, Gortex, and Kevlar. These are
00:05:47 --> 00:05:49 being tested under Mars conditions to
00:05:49 --> 00:05:51 see how they hold up over time, which is
00:05:51 --> 00:05:52 crucial for planning future human
00:05:52 --> 00:05:54 exploration of the red planet. And one
00:05:54 --> 00:05:57 last fun fact, Sherlock has a sidekick,
00:05:57 --> 00:05:59 a color camera called Watson. Yep, just
00:05:59 --> 00:06:00 like Sherlock
00:06:00 --> 00:06:03 Holmes. Okay, now for something truly
00:06:03 --> 00:06:05 mind-blowing. Astronomers have stumbled
00:06:05 --> 00:06:07 upon a new type of giant space
00:06:07 --> 00:06:08 explosion. And get this, they're calling
00:06:08 --> 00:06:12 them extreme nuclear transients or ENTs.
00:06:12 --> 00:06:14 And uh apparently they're the biggest
00:06:14 --> 00:06:17 bang since the big bang itself. These
00:06:17 --> 00:06:20 ENTs are like colossal flares of light
00:06:20 --> 00:06:22 from the hearts of distant galaxies. And
00:06:22 --> 00:06:24 they linger way longer than any flares
00:06:24 --> 00:06:26 we've ever seen before. We're talking
00:06:26 --> 00:06:29 about blasts that release as much energy
00:06:29 --> 00:06:31 as 100 suns would over their entire
00:06:31 --> 00:06:33 lifetimes. I mean, wow. So, what are
00:06:34 --> 00:06:36 they? Well, it turns out they're kind of
00:06:36 --> 00:06:38 like stars being torn apart by black
00:06:38 --> 00:06:40 holes, but on a scale we've never
00:06:40 --> 00:06:43 observed before. Each star is a massive
00:06:43 --> 00:06:45 one, at least three times as massive as
00:06:45 --> 00:06:47 our sun. And each black hole is a super
00:06:47 --> 00:06:49 massive beast lurking in the center of
00:06:49 --> 00:06:52 its host galaxy. Normally, these events
00:06:52 --> 00:06:54 are called tidal disruption events or
00:06:54 --> 00:06:57 tdees. But these ENTs are different.
00:06:57 --> 00:06:59 They're like nearly 10 times brighter
00:06:59 --> 00:07:01 than normal tdees, and they stay
00:07:01 --> 00:07:04 luminous for years, surpassing even the
00:07:04 --> 00:07:06 brightest supernova
00:07:06 --> 00:07:08 explosions. Gaia, the space telescope
00:07:08 --> 00:07:11 whose mission was to map the Milky Way,
00:07:11 --> 00:07:14 actually captured these
00:07:14 --> 00:07:16 explosions. While staring at the sky,
00:07:16 --> 00:07:19 combing through Gaia data, scientists
00:07:19 --> 00:07:22 found two strange events from 2016 and
00:07:22 --> 00:07:24 2018.
00:07:24 --> 00:07:26 After some digging, they figured out
00:07:26 --> 00:07:27 that these events were the same kind of
00:07:27 --> 00:07:29 event as something nicknamed scary
00:07:29 --> 00:07:32 Barbie, which sounds absolutely
00:07:32 --> 00:07:36 terrifying. ENTs are super rare, like 10
00:07:36 --> 00:07:37 million times less frequent than
00:07:37 --> 00:07:40 supernovi, but they give us a new way to
00:07:40 --> 00:07:42 study massive black holes in distant
00:07:42 --> 00:07:45 galaxies. Because they're so bright, we
00:07:45 --> 00:07:47 can see them across vast cosmic
00:07:47 --> 00:07:49 distances. So, in astronomy, looking far
00:07:50 --> 00:07:52 away means looking back in time. By
00:07:52 --> 00:07:54 observing these prolonged flares, we can
00:07:54 --> 00:07:56 learn more about black hole growth
00:07:56 --> 00:07:58 during a key era when the universe was
00:07:58 --> 00:08:01 half its current age. It's like galaxies
00:08:01 --> 00:08:03 were forming stars and feeding their
00:08:03 --> 00:08:05 super massive black holes like 10 times
00:08:05 --> 00:08:07 more vigorously than they do today.
00:08:07 --> 00:08:09 Pretty wild stuff,
00:08:09 --> 00:08:11 huh? And that's all the space and
00:08:11 --> 00:08:13 astronomy news we have for you today.
00:08:13 --> 00:08:15 I've been your host, Anna, and I hope
00:08:15 --> 00:08:16 you enjoyed our journey through the
00:08:16 --> 00:08:19 cosmos. If you want to stay uptodate
00:08:19 --> 00:08:21 with all the latest space happenings, be
00:08:21 --> 00:08:23 sure to visit our website at
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00:08:40 --> 00:08:43 Tik Tok. Thanks for tuning in and we'll
00:08:43 --> 00:08:45 catch you next time on Astronomy Daily.
00:08:45 --> 00:08:48 In the meantime, keep looking up.
00:08:48 --> 00:08:52 day. The stories be
00:08:52 --> 00:09:04 [Music]
00:09:04 --> 00:09:08 told stories