00:00:00 --> 00:00:02 Andrew Dunkley: Hello again. Thanks for joining us on another
00:00:02 --> 00:00:04 episode of Space Nuts. My name is Andrew
00:00:04 --> 00:00:06 Dunkley. It's great to have your company. I
00:00:06 --> 00:00:08 hope you're well. Uh, coming up in this
00:00:08 --> 00:00:11 episode, some exciting storeys. And
00:00:11 --> 00:00:13 one of them is a new
00:00:13 --> 00:00:15 CSIRO map
00:00:16 --> 00:00:18 developed in Australia of
00:00:19 --> 00:00:21 magnetic fields. Now, it's been quite a while
00:00:21 --> 00:00:23 since they updated this and they've got a new
00:00:23 --> 00:00:26 one out. And, uh, it's quite extraordinary,
00:00:26 --> 00:00:28 uh, the way it was done and what it shows and
00:00:28 --> 00:00:31 what it can be used for. Uh, we've also got
00:00:31 --> 00:00:33 a new report about the relationship
00:00:34 --> 00:00:36 or otherwise between, uh, black holes
00:00:36 --> 00:00:39 and dark matter. Now this is interesting
00:00:39 --> 00:00:41 because it's only been a theory
00:00:41 --> 00:00:44 until now. Now, this isn't absolute
00:00:44 --> 00:00:47 proof, but it's a step closer to
00:00:47 --> 00:00:49 proving there is something going on between
00:00:49 --> 00:00:51 the two of them and they just don't want
00:00:51 --> 00:00:53 anyone to know. And the world's first
00:00:53 --> 00:00:56 trillionaire goes public. We'll talk
00:00:56 --> 00:00:59 about all of that on this episode of space
00:00:59 --> 00:01:00 nuts.
00:01:00 --> 00:01:02 Professor Fred Watson: 15 seconds. Guidance is internal.
00:01:02 --> 00:01:05 10, 9. Ignition
00:01:05 --> 00:01:06 sequence start.
00:01:06 --> 00:01:07 Professor Fred Watson: Space nuts.
00:01:07 --> 00:01:10 Professor Fred Watson: 5, 4, 3, 2. 1, 2, 3, 4,
00:01:10 --> 00:01:12 5, 5, 4, 3, 2, 1.
00:01:12 --> 00:01:13 Andrew Dunkley: Space nuts.
00:01:13 --> 00:01:15 Professor Fred Watson: Astronauts report it feels good.
00:01:16 --> 00:01:19 Andrew Dunkley: And he's with us again for another dose of
00:01:19 --> 00:01:21 whatever it is he takes before he talks to
00:01:21 --> 00:01:21 me.
00:01:21 --> 00:01:23 It's Professor Fred Watson Watson, Astronomer
00:01:23 --> 00:01:25 at, uh, large. Hello, Fred Watson.
00:01:25 --> 00:01:27 Professor Fred Watson: It's good cup of tea that I take
00:01:27 --> 00:01:28 normally.
00:01:29 --> 00:01:32 Andrew Dunkley: Uh, I've been drinking a bit more
00:01:32 --> 00:01:35 tea of late. Um, only because, um,
00:01:36 --> 00:01:38 by the afternoon I'm not really into coffee.
00:01:38 --> 00:01:40 But today I did have coffee, so.
00:01:41 --> 00:01:42 Do love my coffee.
00:01:43 --> 00:01:45 Professor Fred Watson: I do too, but I make my own.
00:01:45 --> 00:01:47 Andrew Dunkley: I got the whole barista thing going.
00:01:48 --> 00:01:50 I'm even doing latte art, Fred Watson.
00:01:50 --> 00:01:51 Professor Fred Watson: Oh, really?
00:01:51 --> 00:01:53 Andrew Dunkley: Yeah. I don't know if you'll see this. I took
00:01:53 --> 00:01:55 this photo, um,
00:01:56 --> 00:01:59 today of my latte art. Can you see that?
00:01:59 --> 00:02:00 Professor Fred Watson: That is brilliant.
00:02:00 --> 00:02:00 Professor Fred Watson: Yeah.
00:02:01 --> 00:02:01 Andrew Dunkley: Whoa.
00:02:01 --> 00:02:03 Professor Fred Watson: That's real pro stuff. Self taught
00:02:03 --> 00:02:04 barista.
00:02:05 --> 00:02:05 Professor Fred Watson: Yes.
00:02:06 --> 00:02:08 Andrew Dunkley: I don't know what it is. It's like some kind
00:02:08 --> 00:02:09 of flower, like a lotus flower.
00:02:09 --> 00:02:11 Professor Fred Watson: Well, it reminds me of ears of corn.
00:02:12 --> 00:02:14 Andrew Dunkley: Oh, yeah, it does, doesn't it? Yeah, yeah,
00:02:14 --> 00:02:16 yeah, that's what it was. Or just ducks
00:02:16 --> 00:02:17 sitting on top of each other or something.
00:02:17 --> 00:02:20 Professor Fred Watson: Could be your. Could be your corny latte.
00:02:20 --> 00:02:23 Andrew Dunkley: Yes, it could be. Anyway, I've been working
00:02:23 --> 00:02:23 on that.
00:02:23 --> 00:02:25 Professor Fred Watson: That's very good. Yeah.
00:02:25 --> 00:02:27 Andrew Dunkley: I was going to do a whole series and put them
00:02:27 --> 00:02:30 on Instagram of my progression through being
00:02:30 --> 00:02:32 really crap at it and to reaching a
00:02:32 --> 00:02:35 point where it's, you know, something to look
00:02:35 --> 00:02:37 at, but I didn't bother and now I wish I had
00:02:37 --> 00:02:40 because I've had some epic fails.
00:02:40 --> 00:02:43 But um, that one came out quite well today.
00:02:43 --> 00:02:44 Professor Fred Watson: That's very nice. Well done.
00:02:44 --> 00:02:47 Andrew Dunkley: M. Right, let's uh, let's get on with this
00:02:47 --> 00:02:49 because, uh, we've got a lot to talk about as
00:02:49 --> 00:02:50 always.
00:02:50 --> 00:02:52 And our first storey comes from Australia,
00:02:53 --> 00:02:55 mate. And it is the uh,
00:02:56 --> 00:02:58 remapping of uh, the magnetic
00:02:58 --> 00:03:01 fields of a, uh, large swathe of
00:03:01 --> 00:03:04 um, uh, the universe. Or is it a large
00:03:04 --> 00:03:07 swathe of uh, whatever piece of the backyard
00:03:07 --> 00:03:09 sky someone can see out of. Not sure how much
00:03:09 --> 00:03:10 of it they
00:03:10 --> 00:03:13 Professor Fred Watson: got a good chunk of it
00:03:13 --> 00:03:15 actually. I, uh, thought so because, um.
00:03:16 --> 00:03:19 So these observations were made
00:03:19 --> 00:03:22 at uh, uh, a site in
00:03:22 --> 00:03:24 Western Australia known as Inyariman il Ghare
00:03:24 --> 00:03:27 Bundara, which is Wajari for
00:03:27 --> 00:03:29 sharing sky and stars. The Wodgery people are
00:03:29 --> 00:03:32 the traditional owners there. And it's also
00:03:32 --> 00:03:34 called the CSIRO Murchison Radio Astronomy
00:03:34 --> 00:03:36 Observatory, but we tend to refer to it as
00:03:36 --> 00:03:39 Inyarimana il Ghari Bundara because it's a
00:03:39 --> 00:03:41 very nice name. Uh,
00:03:42 --> 00:03:45 so what's there? There is, um, first of
00:03:45 --> 00:03:47 all, um, it's the site for the
00:03:47 --> 00:03:50 Low Frequency, uh, arm, um, of the
00:03:50 --> 00:03:53 Square Kilometre Array. Uh, Square Kilometre
00:03:53 --> 00:03:56 Array Observatory exists in three places.
00:03:56 --> 00:03:58 Uh, one is western, earlier where the Low
00:03:58 --> 00:04:00 Frequency antennas are. The uh, other is
00:04:00 --> 00:04:03 in South Africa where the mid Frequency
00:04:03 --> 00:04:05 antennas are. And the other is near
00:04:05 --> 00:04:08 Manchester where the headquarters are. Um,
00:04:08 --> 00:04:10 that's Chodrell bank is where the
00:04:10 --> 00:04:13 headquarters of SKAO are. Uh, uh, and
00:04:13 --> 00:04:15 they've just got a new Director General, uh,
00:04:15 --> 00:04:18 by the way, um, Jessica Dempsey I think is
00:04:18 --> 00:04:21 her name. Somebody I've kind of run
00:04:21 --> 00:04:23 into before over the years. Uh, is um,
00:04:24 --> 00:04:27 uh, the new Director General of the SKAO
00:04:27 --> 00:04:30 Observatory. Sorry, SKA Observatory. Anyway,
00:04:30 --> 00:04:32 yeah, also on the site in Western Australia
00:04:33 --> 00:04:35 is ascap, which is the
00:04:35 --> 00:04:37 Australian SKA
00:04:38 --> 00:04:40 Pathfinder. A s K a p.
00:04:41 --> 00:04:42 Coincidence.
00:04:43 --> 00:04:45 Andrew Dunkley: Uh, an ASCAP is also something you can wear
00:04:45 --> 00:04:46 if you don't have any pants.
00:04:50 --> 00:04:52 Professor Fred Watson: There's no answer to that, Andrew.
00:04:52 --> 00:04:53 Andrew Dunkley: Uh, no,
00:04:55 --> 00:04:56 no, that one. Can't we just let that one.
00:04:56 --> 00:04:58 Professor Fred Watson: No, I might leave that one alone. Yeah.
00:04:59 --> 00:05:01 Anyway, notwithstanding that.
00:05:02 --> 00:05:04 See, you don't get this on other podcasts, do
00:05:04 --> 00:05:07 you? It's why we're number one in Iceland.
00:05:07 --> 00:05:10 Andrew Dunkley: That's right, we are. Thank you.
00:05:10 --> 00:05:10 Iceland.
00:05:11 --> 00:05:13 Professor Fred Watson: Absolutely. Go for it. Um,
00:05:14 --> 00:05:16 I forgot. Yes. ASCAP,
00:05:17 --> 00:05:20 not the garment, but the um,
00:05:20 --> 00:05:23 Radio Telescope Array, 3612 metre
00:05:23 --> 00:05:25 dishes which were built um, over
00:05:25 --> 00:05:28 the. I guess 15 years ago was when they
00:05:28 --> 00:05:30 started. It's been operational for probably
00:05:30 --> 00:05:33 more than 10 years now and done some fabulous
00:05:33 --> 00:05:36 work. Uh, but the latest piece of high
00:05:36 --> 00:05:39 profile research that's come from ASCAP is
00:05:39 --> 00:05:41 exactly as you've said, the largest
00:05:41 --> 00:05:44 magnetic map of the universe ever produced,
00:05:44 --> 00:05:46 five times larger than all previous efforts
00:05:46 --> 00:05:49 combined. And it marks the beginning of a new
00:05:49 --> 00:05:51 generation of research into the field of
00:05:51 --> 00:05:53 intergalactic magnetism. And I'm reading
00:05:53 --> 00:05:55 there from the CSIRO news release,
00:05:56 --> 00:05:58 um, probably spot the hype but it's well
00:05:58 --> 00:06:00 deserved type as well and a, uh, well
00:06:01 --> 00:06:03 deserved kudos to the team leader Alec
00:06:03 --> 00:06:05 Thompson of csiro. Um,
00:06:06 --> 00:06:08 what they've done is used
00:06:08 --> 00:06:11 the telescope uh, in a, I
00:06:11 --> 00:06:14 suppose in an innovative way.
00:06:14 --> 00:06:16 Uh, how do you measure magnetic fields? Well
00:06:16 --> 00:06:18 you know normally to measure a magnetic field
00:06:18 --> 00:06:21 we stick uh, a magnetometer in the way.
00:06:21 --> 00:06:23 That's how magnetic fields are measured in
00:06:23 --> 00:06:25 the solar system by various spacecraft
00:06:25 --> 00:06:27 because they carry magnetometers which
00:06:27 --> 00:06:29 measure the local magnetic field of where you
00:06:29 --> 00:06:32 are. Um, and that gives us
00:06:32 --> 00:06:35 some insights into not just the sun's
00:06:35 --> 00:06:36 magnetic field, not the Earth's magnetic
00:06:36 --> 00:06:38 field and the sun's magnetic field, but also
00:06:39 --> 00:06:41 uh, courtesy of Voyager, the two Voyager
00:06:41 --> 00:06:44 spacecraft. The galaxy's magnetic field
00:06:44 --> 00:06:46 because we can sense the direction of that
00:06:46 --> 00:06:49 with the magnetometers uh, carried by those
00:06:49 --> 00:06:51 spacecraft which are now beyond the sun's
00:06:51 --> 00:06:53 magnetic influence. But
00:06:54 --> 00:06:57 uh, it's quite a long jump
00:06:57 --> 00:07:00 from the environs of the
00:07:00 --> 00:07:02 solar system to the universe as a whole,
00:07:03 --> 00:07:05 uh, which is what these scientists have done.
00:07:06 --> 00:07:08 And the basic technique
00:07:09 --> 00:07:12 is uh, it's all about
00:07:12 --> 00:07:15 um, polarisation and
00:07:15 --> 00:07:18 we've talked about polarisation before, we
00:07:18 --> 00:07:21 all know what it does when we
00:07:21 --> 00:07:23 wear our uh, polarising sunglasses and you're
00:07:23 --> 00:07:26 driving your car into the sunlight and
00:07:26 --> 00:07:29 there's a huge reflection coming off the
00:07:29 --> 00:07:31 road, especially if it's wet. Uh, and your
00:07:31 --> 00:07:34 polarising sunglasses magically take away
00:07:35 --> 00:07:37 that's happening because uh, the light waves
00:07:38 --> 00:07:39 uh, have um,
00:07:41 --> 00:07:43 if you think of them as just being wiggles in
00:07:43 --> 00:07:45 space, which they are, ah, electromagnetic
00:07:45 --> 00:07:48 wiggles, they have a preferred direction.
00:07:48 --> 00:07:51 Um, normal light has a mix of all these
00:07:51 --> 00:07:54 directions but uh, it turns out that
00:07:54 --> 00:07:56 you can separate out them by using
00:07:56 --> 00:07:59 well a polarising filter which is what we've
00:07:59 --> 00:08:01 got in our sunglasses that only lets through
00:08:01 --> 00:08:04 the vibrations that are vertical. That's the
00:08:04 --> 00:08:06 vertical direction of the light that's coming
00:08:06 --> 00:08:09 to you because the horizontal ones which are
00:08:10 --> 00:08:13 very um, much reflected uh,
00:08:14 --> 00:08:17 in the reflection from the wet road, they are
00:08:17 --> 00:08:20 cancelled out and so you don't see them. Uh,
00:08:21 --> 00:08:24 so we're kind of familiar with that idea of
00:08:24 --> 00:08:26 the direction of vibration of
00:08:26 --> 00:08:29 Light waves. Well, the same holds good
00:08:29 --> 00:08:32 in, um, in radio waves. And
00:08:32 --> 00:08:34 so ASCAP and many other radio
00:08:34 --> 00:08:37 telescopes can actually sense the
00:08:37 --> 00:08:39 polarisation of the radio
00:08:39 --> 00:08:41 signals that they're receiving from deep
00:08:41 --> 00:08:44 space. Uh, and so that's all
00:08:44 --> 00:08:46 well and good, you can sense the
00:08:46 --> 00:08:48 polarisation, but you can also
00:08:48 --> 00:08:51 detect if that polarisation's
00:08:51 --> 00:08:54 been twisted. And that's what happens
00:08:54 --> 00:08:56 when the light passes through a magnetic
00:08:56 --> 00:08:59 field. Um, it actually rotates,
00:08:59 --> 00:09:02 called Faraday rotation. It's the plane of
00:09:02 --> 00:09:05 the radio waves twists. And
00:09:05 --> 00:09:08 you can detect that with an array like
00:09:08 --> 00:09:11 ascap. And that is what has allowed
00:09:11 --> 00:09:13 people to measure the magnetic field of the
00:09:13 --> 00:09:16 universe. Because what you do
00:09:16 --> 00:09:19 is you look at, uh, the light from
00:09:19 --> 00:09:22 a distant galaxy and you look at the way
00:09:22 --> 00:09:25 its polarisation changes, uh, as that
00:09:25 --> 00:09:28 light comes towards us by using this
00:09:28 --> 00:09:31 technique. And so what you're saying is
00:09:31 --> 00:09:33 that you've got a kind of, um,
00:09:34 --> 00:09:37 a beacon lamp in the distance and
00:09:37 --> 00:09:39 what you can sense is what's happening to the
00:09:39 --> 00:09:41 light coming from that as it passes through
00:09:41 --> 00:09:44 magnetic fields on its way. And so
00:09:44 --> 00:09:47 that's the basis of the map, as
00:09:47 --> 00:09:50 far as I can tell from, because I'm not a
00:09:50 --> 00:09:52 radio astronomer, which is pain, the obvious,
00:09:52 --> 00:09:54 probably from the way I'm talking about it.
00:09:54 --> 00:09:57 Um, I think you probably
00:09:57 --> 00:10:00 don't know how far away that magnetic field
00:10:00 --> 00:10:02 is. And so, um, what you can
00:10:02 --> 00:10:04 infer is, uh,
00:10:06 --> 00:10:08 for example, how rapidly it changes, uh,
00:10:08 --> 00:10:11 depending on the position
00:10:11 --> 00:10:13 in the sky. Um,
00:10:15 --> 00:10:17 when you look at this map, and I urge our
00:10:17 --> 00:10:19 listeners to have a look at it, it's pretty
00:10:19 --> 00:10:21 easy to find and largest magnetic map of the
00:10:21 --> 00:10:24 universe yet. Um, you'll see lots of colours.
00:10:24 --> 00:10:27 Um, the colours, I think, are colour coded in
00:10:27 --> 00:10:29 that. I, um, think if I remember rightly,
00:10:29 --> 00:10:32 red is with the North Pole
00:10:32 --> 00:10:35 pointing towards us of the magnetism, and
00:10:35 --> 00:10:38 blue is it pointing the other way. Um,
00:10:38 --> 00:10:41 and so that, uh, lets you sense the
00:10:41 --> 00:10:44 magnetism along that line of sight. And so
00:10:44 --> 00:10:46 the biggest detail is actually in the
00:10:46 --> 00:10:49 galactic centre, which is full of churning
00:10:49 --> 00:10:51 magnetic fields. I guess you are having a
00:10:51 --> 00:10:51 look at it now.
00:10:52 --> 00:10:54 Andrew Dunkley: I'm looking at it right this minute. And
00:10:54 --> 00:10:56 yeah, you're right that they're explaining
00:10:56 --> 00:10:58 that just like, um, you've got blue shift and
00:10:58 --> 00:11:01 redshift with light waves, the magnetic
00:11:01 --> 00:11:04 fields have the same kind of qualities in
00:11:04 --> 00:11:07 terms of north, south, um, on the
00:11:07 --> 00:11:09 magnetic plane. And yes, the centre of the
00:11:09 --> 00:11:11 Milky Way galaxy is probably the most
00:11:11 --> 00:11:14 volatile part of this entire picture. Um,
00:11:14 --> 00:11:16 which is not surprising. We live there.
00:11:17 --> 00:11:17 Professor Fred Watson: That's right.
00:11:17 --> 00:11:18 Andrew Dunkley: We know all about volatility.
00:11:19 --> 00:11:21 Professor Fred Watson: Yeah. It's home from home.
00:11:21 --> 00:11:24 Uh, and just going back to, um, what
00:11:24 --> 00:11:27 you said a few minutes ago, um, there is a
00:11:27 --> 00:11:30 hole in the, uh, map. And
00:11:30 --> 00:11:33 that's because ascap, there's certainly
00:11:33 --> 00:11:35 regions of the northern sky that ASCAP can't
00:11:35 --> 00:11:37 see because they're permanently below the
00:11:37 --> 00:11:38 horizon. They're relatively small, actually,
00:11:38 --> 00:11:41 because ASCAP can look a long way down
00:11:41 --> 00:11:42 towards the horizon, much further than we
00:11:42 --> 00:11:45 can. In optical astronomy. In optical
00:11:45 --> 00:11:47 astronomy, the atmosphere just gets too thick
00:11:47 --> 00:11:49 when you're looking very low down until you
00:11:49 --> 00:11:51 get all the distortions and everything from
00:11:51 --> 00:11:53 the atmosphere. That doesn't happen, uh, with
00:11:53 --> 00:11:55 low frequency radio waves. Um,
00:11:56 --> 00:11:58 the gap that's missing because of the
00:11:58 --> 00:12:00 Northern Hemisphere, uh, because it's not
00:12:00 --> 00:12:02 visible to the telescope, that's actually
00:12:02 --> 00:12:04 relatively small compared with if it was an
00:12:04 --> 00:12:06 optical astronomy picture that you were
00:12:06 --> 00:12:09 looking at. But yes, this map has
00:12:09 --> 00:12:11 the line of the Milky Way across its equator,
00:12:11 --> 00:12:14 across the middle. Um, lots of magnetic
00:12:14 --> 00:12:17 turbulence in there, some really intriguing
00:12:17 --> 00:12:19 features, things that look like magnetic
00:12:19 --> 00:12:22 fingers just sort of pointing around. It's
00:12:22 --> 00:12:24 a remarkable map which, um, yeah, I encourage
00:12:24 --> 00:12:25 people to have a look at.
00:12:26 --> 00:12:29 Andrew Dunkley: Now, just by way of, um, taking this a step
00:12:29 --> 00:12:31 further. Uh, what can they now,
00:12:31 --> 00:12:34 or what can anybody now do with a map like
00:12:34 --> 00:12:36 this? Because it's been made publicly
00:12:36 --> 00:12:37 available, hasn't it?
00:12:37 --> 00:12:40 Professor Fred Watson: Yes, so that's exactly right. Those data, uh,
00:12:40 --> 00:12:43 are now publicly available. By the way, I
00:12:43 --> 00:12:45 do like the name of it, which is
00:12:45 --> 00:12:46 Spice.
00:12:46 --> 00:12:47 Andrew Dunkley: Spice Racks.
00:12:47 --> 00:12:50 Professor Fred Watson: Yeah. Uh, so Racks is
00:12:50 --> 00:12:53 the Rapid ASCAP Continuum Survey.
00:12:53 --> 00:12:56 And I've forgotten what Spice is, but it's
00:12:56 --> 00:12:59 something equally, equally delightful.
00:12:59 --> 00:13:01 Uh, but the Spice Racks Survey, I think is,
00:13:01 --> 00:13:04 uh, is. It's got its own, uh,
00:13:04 --> 00:13:06 own. Own charm about it.
00:13:06 --> 00:13:09 Andrew Dunkley: I was going to say something tongue in
00:13:09 --> 00:13:11 cheek about a girl group named Something to
00:13:11 --> 00:13:12 do with spice.
00:13:12 --> 00:13:13 Professor Fred Watson: Oh, yes, I know that.
00:13:14 --> 00:13:16 Andrew Dunkley: Then I thought, no, you can't really
00:13:16 --> 00:13:17 associate that with racks. You could get
00:13:17 --> 00:13:18 yourself smashed.
00:13:20 --> 00:13:22 Professor Fred Watson: I would leave that well alone. I will.
00:13:22 --> 00:13:23 Andrew Dunkley: I won't mention it.
00:13:23 --> 00:13:25 Professor Fred Watson: Yeah, so, um,
00:13:25 --> 00:13:28 it's. Yes, so it's so. And, and yes,
00:13:28 --> 00:13:31 as data are already publicly
00:13:31 --> 00:13:34 available, uh, research groups are already
00:13:35 --> 00:13:37 actually digging through this to see
00:13:37 --> 00:13:40 what it tells us about the, you know, the
00:13:40 --> 00:13:42 magnetism of galaxies, for a start.
00:13:42 --> 00:13:43 Professor Fred Watson: Uh,
00:13:44 --> 00:13:47 Professor Fred Watson: and just the way the environment of a galaxy
00:13:48 --> 00:13:50 is dominated by a particular magnetic field.
00:13:50 --> 00:13:53 It's only recently that we've understood
00:13:53 --> 00:13:56 that cosmic magnetic fields. That,
00:13:56 --> 00:13:58 uh, is magnetic fields in space play a huge
00:13:58 --> 00:14:01 role in so many areas of astrophysics,
00:14:01 --> 00:14:04 but certainly in the way galaxies evolve
00:14:04 --> 00:14:07 over the millennia. Millennia.
00:14:07 --> 00:14:10 I suppose they are uh, the way they evolve,
00:14:10 --> 00:14:13 uh, is, um, very much
00:14:13 --> 00:14:16 dominated by the local magnetic fields. And
00:14:16 --> 00:14:19 one of the big puzzles in cosmology, the
00:14:19 --> 00:14:22 science of the universe as a whole, is where
00:14:22 --> 00:14:23 did these magnetic fields come from in the
00:14:23 --> 00:14:25 first place? And it's actually
00:14:26 --> 00:14:29 one of the things on the list of target
00:14:29 --> 00:14:32 science. The Square Kilometre Array
00:14:32 --> 00:14:35 itself was designed to address what's the
00:14:35 --> 00:14:38 origin of the cosmic magnetic field, uh,
00:14:38 --> 00:14:41 because we really don't know how they came to
00:14:41 --> 00:14:44 exist. And more than that, we don't
00:14:44 --> 00:14:46 know how magnetic fields have changed as, you
00:14:46 --> 00:14:49 know, as the universe itself has evolved. All
00:14:49 --> 00:14:51 this lets you do that because, of course, as
00:14:51 --> 00:14:52 you look further out into space, you're
00:14:52 --> 00:14:55 looking further back in time. So there's a
00:14:55 --> 00:14:56 time dimension of this as well.
00:14:57 --> 00:14:59 Andrew Dunkley: Yeah, there's a lot of magnetism out there.
00:14:59 --> 00:15:01 And as you say, they don't know where it came
00:15:01 --> 00:15:04 from. Uh, we probably would have solved it
00:15:04 --> 00:15:06 except dark matter and dark energy came along
00:15:06 --> 00:15:07 and we went, oh, well, this is more exciting.
00:15:08 --> 00:15:10 But, um, yeah, it's just another one of those
00:15:10 --> 00:15:11 mysteries.
00:15:12 --> 00:15:14 Professor Fred Watson: It is. And I'm sure,
00:15:14 --> 00:15:17 um, all the scientists who've been involved
00:15:17 --> 00:15:20 with this have got magnetic personalities.
00:15:20 --> 00:15:23 Oh, sorry. I do my best.
00:15:23 --> 00:15:24 We aim to please.
00:15:24 --> 00:15:26 Andrew Dunkley: Pretty good, that one. All right. If you'd
00:15:26 --> 00:15:28 like to read up on it, you can do that
00:15:28 --> 00:15:30 through the scene. CSIRO website. It's an
00:15:30 --> 00:15:33 Australian website and you can download the
00:15:33 --> 00:15:35 map. It's only 6 million megabytes. It's
00:15:35 --> 00:15:38 a 6 megabytes. It's not a big file in the
00:15:38 --> 00:15:41 modern age. Uh, you can also read the
00:15:41 --> 00:15:44 paper in publications of the Astronomical
00:15:44 --> 00:15:47 Society of Australia. This is
00:15:47 --> 00:15:49 Space Nuts with Professor Fred Watson Watson
00:15:49 --> 00:15:50 and Andrew Dunkley.
00:15:55 --> 00:15:56 Space Nuts.
00:15:56 --> 00:15:59 Professor Fred Watson: All right. Um, now, you
00:15:59 --> 00:16:01 did press, didn't you?
00:16:01 --> 00:16:04 Andrew Dunkley: I did press record. Yes. Um, yes,
00:16:04 --> 00:16:06 the giant gap was a misfire.
00:16:06 --> 00:16:07 Professor Fred Watson: Oh, good. That's good.
00:16:07 --> 00:16:08 Andrew Dunkley: Okay, we get those.
00:16:09 --> 00:16:12 Uh, now our next storey, it's a, uh, new
00:16:12 --> 00:16:14 report about the relationship between
00:16:14 --> 00:16:16 black holes and dark matter. Now this is,
00:16:16 --> 00:16:19 this is something that our audience has quite
00:16:19 --> 00:16:21 often thrown up. You know, there's got to be
00:16:21 --> 00:16:24 a connection, uh, between black holes and
00:16:24 --> 00:16:26 dark matter, et cetera, et cetera. Uh,
00:16:27 --> 00:16:29 and now they've released a paper that's
00:16:29 --> 00:16:31 suggesting just that.
00:16:31 --> 00:16:34 Professor Fred Watson: Yes, this is really interesting stuff. And of
00:16:34 --> 00:16:37 course, um, it covers
00:16:37 --> 00:16:39 two of the most popular topics that we
00:16:40 --> 00:16:43 discuss on, uh, Spacenuts. This is
00:16:43 --> 00:16:45 research, uh, from Virginia Tech,
00:16:46 --> 00:16:48 uh, in the United States. And
00:16:49 --> 00:16:51 it's very neat because it uses a technique
00:16:51 --> 00:16:53 that I've always found absolutely
00:16:53 --> 00:16:56 fascinating, um, which
00:16:56 --> 00:16:59 is it's got A fancy name, uh,
00:16:59 --> 00:17:02 called reverberation mapping. Uh,
00:17:02 --> 00:17:05 but we usually talk about light echoes.
00:17:06 --> 00:17:08 Uh, and the easiest way to
00:17:08 --> 00:17:10 envisage it is, uh, the one that
00:17:11 --> 00:17:13 I think drew
00:17:13 --> 00:17:16 everybody's attention to this phenomenon back
00:17:16 --> 00:17:19 in the 1980s, uh, when
00:17:19 --> 00:17:21 supernova 1987A,
00:17:22 --> 00:17:24 the nearest supernova to us since
00:17:24 --> 00:17:27 Kepler's supernova in 1604, I think it was,
00:17:28 --> 00:17:30 um, that uh, became very much the object
00:17:30 --> 00:17:32 of attention. Uh, it was in the Large
00:17:32 --> 00:17:35 magellanic Cloud, to 165 light
00:17:35 --> 00:17:37 years away from us as the crow flies.
00:17:38 --> 00:17:41 And what was discovered as time
00:17:41 --> 00:17:43 went on was the. So that the
00:17:43 --> 00:17:46 supernova explodes. You've got this brilliant
00:17:46 --> 00:17:48 flash of light. It was easily visible to the
00:17:48 --> 00:17:50 naked eye. I remember looking at it. Uh,
00:17:51 --> 00:17:54 and uh, then as time goes by, the light
00:17:54 --> 00:17:56 fades. But what you get,
00:17:57 --> 00:18:00 uh, uh, as time goes on is a series of
00:18:00 --> 00:18:03 rings around the, apparently around
00:18:04 --> 00:18:07 the site of the explosion. And those
00:18:07 --> 00:18:10 rings are caused by light being
00:18:11 --> 00:18:13 reflected off clouds of dust which
00:18:13 --> 00:18:16 are between us and the supernova. And you
00:18:16 --> 00:18:19 can do all kinds of really neat calculations,
00:18:20 --> 00:18:23 uh, to discover how thick those clouds of
00:18:23 --> 00:18:25 dust are, where they are in relation to the
00:18:25 --> 00:18:27 supernova. Um, um, one of my
00:18:27 --> 00:18:30 colleagues, now sadly no longer with us,
00:18:30 --> 00:18:32 David Allen, was a past master,
00:18:32 --> 00:18:35 uh, about working on this and writing about
00:18:35 --> 00:18:37 it. And uh, those rings are called
00:18:37 --> 00:18:39 light echoes because it's the echo of the
00:18:39 --> 00:18:42 light of the supernova which has now faded
00:18:42 --> 00:18:44 away. But you can still see it because it's
00:18:44 --> 00:18:47 bouncing off clouds of dust in space.
00:18:48 --> 00:18:51 So, so what this article is
00:18:51 --> 00:18:53 about, the Virginia Tech work that we've just
00:18:53 --> 00:18:56 mentioned is we know that black
00:18:56 --> 00:18:58 holes, supermassive black holes, are
00:18:58 --> 00:19:01 surrounded by swirling discs of
00:19:01 --> 00:19:04 matter. Uh, they're called the accretion
00:19:04 --> 00:19:06 disc. It's the stuff that's basically
00:19:06 --> 00:19:09 swirling around the plug hole, um, before it
00:19:09 --> 00:19:11 either gets sucked into the black hole or
00:19:11 --> 00:19:14 shot out vertically from the poles of the
00:19:14 --> 00:19:16 black hole. The rotation poles it in the form
00:19:16 --> 00:19:18 of these jets, which we hear a lot about. But
00:19:18 --> 00:19:20 the accretion disc itself is bright,
00:19:21 --> 00:19:24 um, in X rays and radio radiation.
00:19:25 --> 00:19:27 Uh, once in a while, um, a
00:19:27 --> 00:19:30 larger dollop of matter enters the
00:19:30 --> 00:19:32 accretion disc. And you get this
00:19:32 --> 00:19:35 outburst, you get a brilliant outburst
00:19:36 --> 00:19:39 of radiation. Um, and
00:19:39 --> 00:19:42 that outburst is relatively short lived.
00:19:42 --> 00:19:44 It might last for a few weeks or even months,
00:19:44 --> 00:19:47 but it's short lived. And so what you can
00:19:47 --> 00:19:50 look for is a light echo
00:19:50 --> 00:19:52 around it. Because that light radiates
00:19:52 --> 00:19:55 outwards from the accretion disc. And if it
00:19:55 --> 00:19:58 hits anything outside it,
00:19:58 --> 00:20:01 it will reflect back to us. And we'll see it
00:20:01 --> 00:20:03 at a later date from when
00:20:04 --> 00:20:06 the bright event itself
00:20:06 --> 00:20:09 happened. So you see the bright event in the
00:20:09 --> 00:20:11 accretion disc and then at, uh, some time
00:20:11 --> 00:20:14 later you see an echo of that
00:20:14 --> 00:20:16 light which is being reflected off,
00:20:17 --> 00:20:19 usually gas and D which is surrounding,
00:20:20 --> 00:20:23 uh, the accretion disc. What this storey is
00:20:23 --> 00:20:25 all about though, is that, uh, when you do
00:20:25 --> 00:20:28 calculations about how
00:20:28 --> 00:20:31 much material there
00:20:31 --> 00:20:34 is in the accretion disc where the echo
00:20:34 --> 00:20:37 is taking place, you get a much
00:20:37 --> 00:20:39 higher mass than what you can see. And
00:20:39 --> 00:20:42 that's always the, um,
00:20:42 --> 00:20:44 that's always the um, uh, kind of
00:20:44 --> 00:20:47 telltale signature of dark matter
00:20:48 --> 00:20:50 when you can only see a limited, limited
00:20:50 --> 00:20:53 amount of stuff. But gravity tells you
00:20:53 --> 00:20:55 there's much more, there's more there. And
00:20:55 --> 00:20:57 that's exactly the basis of this storey. So
00:20:57 --> 00:21:00 it's just a new way of detecting
00:21:00 --> 00:21:03 the dark matter, uh, around
00:21:03 --> 00:21:06 black holes. But it looks as though black
00:21:06 --> 00:21:09 holes, as you'd expect, not only
00:21:09 --> 00:21:12 are a magnet for regular matter. I, uh,
00:21:12 --> 00:21:15 mean a gravitational magnet. I guess it's not
00:21:15 --> 00:21:16 magnetic in the sense that we've just been
00:21:16 --> 00:21:19 talking about, uh, but a gravitational,
00:21:19 --> 00:21:21 uh, pull from, for normal matter. It's also a
00:21:21 --> 00:21:24 gravitational pull for dark matter as
00:21:24 --> 00:21:26 well. And it looks as though the dark matter
00:21:26 --> 00:21:29 actually congregates around black holes that
00:21:29 --> 00:21:32 we've got, um, these buildups of dark
00:21:32 --> 00:21:34 matter, ah, in the vicinity of a black
00:21:34 --> 00:21:36 hole. Quite remarkable.
00:21:37 --> 00:21:39 Andrew Dunkley: Now, the situation is that they
00:21:39 --> 00:21:42 haven't absolutely proven it. They've
00:21:42 --> 00:21:45 just come up with a way of suggesting that
00:21:45 --> 00:21:47 this might be the case. But, um.
00:21:47 --> 00:21:49 Yeah, it's not absolute. It's not.
00:21:52 --> 00:21:55 Professor Fred Watson: It is in the sense that, um, they've looked
00:21:55 --> 00:21:57 at this for 14 different
00:21:57 --> 00:22:00 galaxies and all found
00:22:00 --> 00:22:02 cases where, uh,
00:22:03 --> 00:22:05 what you're looking for is the way the mass
00:22:06 --> 00:22:08 changes with distance from the black hole.
00:22:08 --> 00:22:11 And that mass is increasing because you're
00:22:11 --> 00:22:14 looking at stuff swirling around. But the
00:22:14 --> 00:22:16 increase in mass is faster
00:22:17 --> 00:22:19 than the visible matter on its own can
00:22:19 --> 00:22:22 explain. And that's the a. It's
00:22:22 --> 00:22:24 a kind of smoking gun for dark matter,
00:22:24 --> 00:22:24 really.
00:22:24 --> 00:22:27 Andrew Dunkley: Yeah, I, I've, I've found the paragraph. It
00:22:27 --> 00:22:30 says data limitations mean the results are a
00:22:30 --> 00:22:32 proof of concept, not a definitive,
00:22:32 --> 00:22:34 Definitive detection. Detection. But the
00:22:34 --> 00:22:36 study outlines a clear path to confirmation.
00:22:36 --> 00:22:37 Professor Fred Watson: That's right, yeah. So that.
00:22:37 --> 00:22:38 Andrew Dunkley: We're almost there.
00:22:38 --> 00:22:40 Professor Fred Watson: We're almost there. That's. That's exactly
00:22:40 --> 00:22:41 right. We're almost there.
00:22:41 --> 00:22:44 Andrew Dunkley: That is very exciting news. And, um, that
00:22:44 --> 00:22:47 will stop probably 75% of the questions we
00:22:47 --> 00:22:49 get on our Q A editions.
00:22:50 --> 00:22:53 Professor Fred Watson: Well, it, it might, but I Bet it produces
00:22:53 --> 00:22:56 another 150 about what it is that we're
00:22:56 --> 00:22:58 finding and how do we know why? Isn't it mond
00:22:58 --> 00:23:00 and things like that? Yeah.
00:23:00 --> 00:23:03 Andrew Dunkley: Yes. Oh gosh, it will just. It'll never end.
00:23:03 --> 00:23:05 It will never end. I hope it never ends.
00:23:05 --> 00:23:06 Professor Fred Watson: I think it's great.
00:23:07 --> 00:23:08 Andrew Dunkley: But if you want to read about it,
00:23:08 --> 00:23:11 it's@fizz.org uh, they publish the paper
00:23:11 --> 00:23:14 in the Physical Review D. Does that mean
00:23:14 --> 00:23:15 there's an A, B and C that comes with.
00:23:16 --> 00:23:16 Professor Fred Watson: Yes it does.
00:23:17 --> 00:23:18 Andrew Dunkley: I assume so.
00:23:18 --> 00:23:20 Professor Fred Watson: But um, that's a high profile journal though.
00:23:20 --> 00:23:23 Physical Review. It's uh, definitely uh,
00:23:24 --> 00:23:26 uh, you know it's, it's uh, ranks with Nature
00:23:26 --> 00:23:28 and Science and these very high profile
00:23:28 --> 00:23:31 journals. So it's not work that is
00:23:31 --> 00:23:34 in any way secondary. It's not like Space
00:23:34 --> 00:23:37 Nuts where it's adequate. This is top
00:23:38 --> 00:23:39 ranked stuff.
00:23:39 --> 00:23:42 Andrew Dunkley: Indeed it is. Uh, yes. So read about it
00:23:42 --> 00:23:45 at Physical review or@phys.org this is
00:23:45 --> 00:23:46 space Nuts. Andrew Dunkley here with
00:23:46 --> 00:23:48 Professor Fred Watson Watson.
00:23:51 --> 00:23:53 Professor Fred Watson: Okay, we checked all four systems.
00:23:54 --> 00:23:55 Professor Fred Watson: Space Nets.
00:23:56 --> 00:23:58 Andrew Dunkley: Our final storey. Fred Watson takes us
00:23:58 --> 00:24:01 into the realm of um,
00:24:01 --> 00:24:04 publicly offering your company up on the
00:24:04 --> 00:24:04 stock exchange.
00:24:05 --> 00:24:07 Professor Fred Watson: I wonder why we're going to talk about that.
00:24:07 --> 00:24:09 Andrew Dunkley: I wonder why uh, the world's first
00:24:09 --> 00:24:12 trillionaire has just done that in um, a
00:24:12 --> 00:24:14 very interesting way. And to coincide with
00:24:14 --> 00:24:17 the launch, um, he's selling stuff
00:24:17 --> 00:24:20 like we do on the Space Nuts shop. All
00:24:20 --> 00:24:23 sorts of little bits and bobs if you want a
00:24:23 --> 00:24:24 piece of the action.
00:24:24 --> 00:24:25 Professor Fred Watson: Yes, the IPO merch.
00:24:26 --> 00:24:29 Andrew Dunkley: It really is a remarkable storey though. Uh,
00:24:29 --> 00:24:31 elon Musk and SpaceX. Because uh,
00:24:32 --> 00:24:35 as this article briefly um, mentions,
00:24:35 --> 00:24:37 he didn't think the company would survive. He
00:24:37 --> 00:24:40 didn't expect it to actually be a success.
00:24:40 --> 00:24:43 He gave it a very low chance of lasting
00:24:43 --> 00:24:44 and look at him now.
00:24:46 --> 00:24:48 Professor Fred Watson: Quite so. The world's world first
00:24:48 --> 00:24:51 trillionaire. Ah yeah, it's um,
00:24:52 --> 00:24:54 I mean I don't honestly I know virtually
00:24:54 --> 00:24:56 nothing about the world of high finance.
00:24:57 --> 00:24:59 Andrew Dunkley: Um, well you know more than me then.
00:25:00 --> 00:25:02 Professor Fred Watson: When I see numbers like millions and
00:25:02 --> 00:25:04 billions, I always expect there to be light
00:25:04 --> 00:25:06 years after them rather than dollars.
00:25:07 --> 00:25:10 But yeah, it's uh, the, the public,
00:25:10 --> 00:25:13 the IPO initial public offering, um, has
00:25:13 --> 00:25:15 valued this company at uh, something
00:25:15 --> 00:25:18 absolutely huge. Compared with all the other
00:25:18 --> 00:25:20 tech companies that are being floated or are
00:25:20 --> 00:25:23 likely to be floated into public ownership.
00:25:23 --> 00:25:26 It's enormous. Um, is it
00:25:26 --> 00:25:28 170 billion? Am I thinking of the right
00:25:28 --> 00:25:30 number there or is that light years? That
00:25:30 --> 00:25:31 could be light years, I don't know.
00:25:33 --> 00:25:35 Anyway, um, the bottom line so, yes, that
00:25:35 --> 00:25:38 was, um, uh, over the weekend that
00:25:39 --> 00:25:41 m offering IPO
00:25:42 --> 00:25:45 happened, uh, and it was very successful.
00:25:45 --> 00:25:48 Um, I heard people on Friday saying, oh, no,
00:25:48 --> 00:25:50 it'll probably just fail because nobody will
00:25:50 --> 00:25:52 actually believe what Elon Musk's saying.
00:25:53 --> 00:25:55 Well, they might not have believed what he
00:25:55 --> 00:25:56 was saying, but they put their money where
00:25:56 --> 00:25:59 their mouths were. And um, yeah, so it's done
00:25:59 --> 00:26:02 very, very well. Um, I think the number
00:26:02 --> 00:26:05 I'm thinking of is $160.95,
00:26:05 --> 00:26:06 which is the share price.
00:26:07 --> 00:26:09 Andrew Dunkley: Well, I've just looked now and I know this is
00:26:09 --> 00:26:11 being recorded. So by the time people hear
00:26:11 --> 00:26:13 this, the number will change. But at the
00:26:13 --> 00:26:15 moment, at this very moment,
00:26:15 --> 00:26:18 $192.50 in US
00:26:18 --> 00:26:18 dollars.
00:26:18 --> 00:26:21 Professor Fred Watson: All right, so they've already gone up then.
00:26:21 --> 00:26:23 Andrew Dunkley: They've gone up 19.6%.
00:26:23 --> 00:26:24 Professor Fred Watson: Yeah.
00:26:24 --> 00:26:27 Andrew Dunkley: In fact, they're up 31.55% today.
00:26:27 --> 00:26:29 Professor Fred Watson: So not a bad investment really, if you're
00:26:29 --> 00:26:31 into that kind of thing. Yeah, well, we're
00:26:31 --> 00:26:33 not into that kind of thing, but we're
00:26:33 --> 00:26:35 definitely into merge. Uh, and that's what
00:26:35 --> 00:26:38 this storey's about because,
00:26:38 --> 00:26:41 um. Uh, I guess the one
00:26:41 --> 00:26:44 thing you can not accuse Elon
00:26:44 --> 00:26:47 Musk of is lacking flair, um,
00:26:47 --> 00:26:49 because he's done this very nicely. You can
00:26:49 --> 00:26:50 buy a mission patch,
00:26:52 --> 00:26:52 Professor Fred Watson: uh,
00:26:52 --> 00:26:55 Professor Fred Watson: for the ipo, uh, which says
00:26:55 --> 00:26:58 the future is public. There's a lovely
00:26:58 --> 00:27:01 embroidered starship in the
00:27:01 --> 00:27:03 background. Uh, in the middle it says
00:27:03 --> 00:27:05 SPCX, which is SpaceX liftoff
00:27:06 --> 00:27:08 underneath it. And, uh, SpaceX
00:27:08 --> 00:27:11 2026. Uh, and it's also got a four
00:27:11 --> 00:27:13 leaf clover on it, which I think is present
00:27:13 --> 00:27:16 on all Elon Musk. SpaceX.
00:27:16 --> 00:27:18 Andrew Dunkley: I think that's been his logo since day one.
00:27:18 --> 00:27:21 Professor Fred Watson: Yes. Yeah. M a sign of good luck.
00:27:21 --> 00:27:24 Maybe that's what's done it. But the thing I
00:27:24 --> 00:27:27 liked was, um, uh,
00:27:27 --> 00:27:29 you can have a souvenir bell.
00:27:30 --> 00:27:33 And I guess I don't know whether
00:27:33 --> 00:27:35 bells are normally associated. I know they're
00:27:35 --> 00:27:37 certainly associated with the stock exchange,
00:27:37 --> 00:27:40 but whether with, uh, public offerings,
00:27:40 --> 00:27:42 they're associated. But they certainly are in
00:27:42 --> 00:27:44 this case. And what he's chosen for the shape
00:27:44 --> 00:27:46 of his bell is something absolutely perfect.
00:27:46 --> 00:27:49 It's the bell, um, of,
00:27:49 --> 00:27:52 uh, a Raptor engine. These rocket
00:27:52 --> 00:27:55 motors have a very strongly bell shaped,
00:27:55 --> 00:27:58 uh, thrust chamber. I guess it's the, um,
00:27:58 --> 00:28:01 opening, uh, that lets all the gas out, uh,
00:28:01 --> 00:28:03 after it's been ignited in the combustion
00:28:04 --> 00:28:05 combustion chamber above it. And so it's a
00:28:05 --> 00:28:08 scale replica of the Raptor engines that
00:28:08 --> 00:28:11 actually power the Falcon
00:28:11 --> 00:28:13 Heavy, um. I beg your pardon, the super heavy
00:28:13 --> 00:28:16 Booster, which is the basis of starship.
00:28:16 --> 00:28:19 It's got 33 of these. And
00:28:19 --> 00:28:22 um, uh, this one's
00:28:22 --> 00:28:24 got a little clapper in the middle that lets
00:28:24 --> 00:28:27 you ring it as well as all the artwork. And
00:28:27 --> 00:28:28 apparently it rings. Yes, because there's a
00:28:28 --> 00:28:31 video on the website that shows you that, uh,
00:28:31 --> 00:28:32 they
00:28:32 --> 00:28:34 Andrew Dunkley: haven't released those yet to the
00:28:34 --> 00:28:35 public.
00:28:35 --> 00:28:35 Professor Fred Watson: That's right.
00:28:35 --> 00:28:37 Andrew Dunkley: They will be out probably. I think they're
00:28:37 --> 00:28:40 talking December. Yeah, um,
00:28:40 --> 00:28:43 yeah, they're sort of an 18 centimetre or
00:28:43 --> 00:28:45 7 inch scale model of the, the
00:28:45 --> 00:28:48 SpaceX Raptor Bell. This
00:28:48 --> 00:28:51 one has a, you know, clunker in it that makes
00:28:51 --> 00:28:53 it ring. I don't know what that thing's
00:28:53 --> 00:28:56 called inside the bell, the dinghy thing.
00:28:56 --> 00:28:59 Professor Fred Watson: It's a clapper, is it? That's the technical
00:28:59 --> 00:29:00 name. Yeah, for.
00:29:00 --> 00:29:02 Andrew Dunkley: Anyway, so they're selling those, they're
00:29:02 --> 00:29:04 selling, uh, tote bag and
00:29:05 --> 00:29:07 um, as you said, mission patches, T shirts,
00:29:08 --> 00:29:11 caps, you
00:29:11 --> 00:29:13 Professor Fred Watson: know, he's um, he's the sort of
00:29:13 --> 00:29:15 Andrew Dunkley: bloke that never lets opportunity get away.
00:29:15 --> 00:29:18 Professor Fred Watson: None whatsoever. I, I did hear
00:29:19 --> 00:29:22 some of the things that he said publicly at
00:29:22 --> 00:29:24 the launch which made me cringe,
00:29:25 --> 00:29:26 uh, because,
00:29:28 --> 00:29:31 you know, I can, I can, can just about,
00:29:32 --> 00:29:34 um, believe that we
00:29:34 --> 00:29:37 might get humans to Mars in his lifetime.
00:29:38 --> 00:29:41 It won't be millions. And that's because
00:29:41 --> 00:29:43 that's immoral, apart from anything else.
00:29:44 --> 00:29:47 Um, but he was talking about,
00:29:47 --> 00:29:50 uh, you know, flying through,
00:29:50 --> 00:29:53 around the solar system and beyond.
00:29:54 --> 00:29:57 And at the moment that is off
00:29:57 --> 00:30:00 the agenda. Physics doesn't let you do
00:30:00 --> 00:30:00 that.
00:30:01 --> 00:30:03 Uh, just actually as a little footnote to
00:30:03 --> 00:30:06 that, I read a paper yesterday, uh, which
00:30:06 --> 00:30:09 is about, you know, the idea of
00:30:09 --> 00:30:12 using, um, photonic
00:30:12 --> 00:30:14 propulsion, or basically light, Ah,
00:30:14 --> 00:30:17 energy blasted at a light sail. You've got a
00:30:17 --> 00:30:20 laser, uh, you fire it at this light sail and
00:30:20 --> 00:30:22 the spacecraft accelerates because of that.
00:30:22 --> 00:30:24 That's all fine and dandy and will work,
00:30:25 --> 00:30:27 um, if you can make your spacecraft light
00:30:27 --> 00:30:29 enough. But it turns out that you're not ever
00:30:29 --> 00:30:31 going to get near the speed of light
00:30:32 --> 00:30:34 beyond about 75% of the speed of light.
00:30:35 --> 00:30:37 You, uh, get something called relativistic
00:30:37 --> 00:30:40 drag, uh, where space itself drags on the
00:30:40 --> 00:30:42 light sail as well as any kind of
00:30:42 --> 00:30:45 interstellar matter that you've got to plough
00:30:45 --> 00:30:47 through at 75% of the speed of light.
00:30:47 --> 00:30:50 So that's not going to get us touring around
00:30:50 --> 00:30:50 the galaxy.
00:30:51 --> 00:30:52 Andrew Dunkley: No, we'll have to find another way.
00:30:52 --> 00:30:54 Professor Fred Watson: Need another way? Yes.
00:30:54 --> 00:30:56 Andrew Dunkley: They need to go to science fiction, um,
00:30:56 --> 00:30:58 writers and see what they've come up with.
00:30:59 --> 00:31:01 Professor Fred Watson: Maybe that's what Elon's thinking of. Maybe
00:31:01 --> 00:31:03 he was suddenly in the realm of science
00:31:03 --> 00:31:05 fiction, but he didn't bother to tell us.
00:31:05 --> 00:31:08 Andrew Dunkley: No, maybe not, no. But there's no, Nothing
00:31:08 --> 00:31:10 fictional about his, um, ip.
00:31:11 --> 00:31:12 Professor Fred Watson: No, not at all.
00:31:12 --> 00:31:14 Andrew Dunkley: Uh, initial public offering that is out there
00:31:14 --> 00:31:17 and it is going gangbusters. It's burning
00:31:17 --> 00:31:19 like a raptor at the moment.
00:31:20 --> 00:31:23 Professor Fred Watson: Yeah, probably will. I mean, you know,
00:31:23 --> 00:31:25 you've got to give the guy credit. Uh,
00:31:26 --> 00:31:28 two of the biggest breakthroughs of our, of
00:31:28 --> 00:31:31 our generation, huh? Electric vehicles
00:31:31 --> 00:31:34 and, um, reusable booster rockets. And
00:31:34 --> 00:31:35 basically they've come from him.
00:31:35 --> 00:31:38 Andrew Dunkley: Yes, they have. It's quite
00:31:38 --> 00:31:40 extraordinary. Yeah, you can read about it at
00:31:41 --> 00:31:44 collectspace. Uh, dot com. We, um,
00:31:44 --> 00:31:46 won't tell you all the prices of everything
00:31:46 --> 00:31:48 he's selling because that's, you know, you go
00:31:48 --> 00:31:50 and have a look. Um,
00:31:51 --> 00:31:54 totally your call. Um, but I do like the
00:31:54 --> 00:31:56 idea of mission patches and I'm pretty sure I
00:31:56 --> 00:31:59 suggested that to Huw many years ago that we
00:31:59 --> 00:32:01 should have mission patches.
00:32:01 --> 00:32:02 Professor Fred Watson: Yes, yes, we do.
00:32:02 --> 00:32:05 Andrew Dunkley: Yes. I've got something we should. A new one
00:32:05 --> 00:32:06 for every episode.
00:32:07 --> 00:32:08 Professor Fred Watson: Oh, all right. Okay.
00:32:09 --> 00:32:10 Andrew Dunkley: No, that's a bit much.
00:32:10 --> 00:32:12 Professor Fred Watson: Look, the trouble is the mission patches,
00:32:12 --> 00:32:14 they would just be adequate and if you.
00:32:15 --> 00:32:17 Andrew Dunkley: Although, I think, ah, our logo would make a
00:32:17 --> 00:32:18 great patch.
00:32:19 --> 00:32:20 Professor Fred Watson: It would. Yeah.
00:32:20 --> 00:32:20 Professor Fred Watson: Yeah.
00:32:21 --> 00:32:24 Andrew Dunkley: Anyway, um, we'll, we'll do that one day
00:32:24 --> 00:32:25 maybe. I don't know. There's plenty of other
00:32:25 --> 00:32:27 stuff in the shop. Just go and have a look in
00:32:27 --> 00:32:28 our shop. It's on our website.
00:32:28 --> 00:32:31 Spacenutspodcast.com or
00:32:31 --> 00:32:33 spacenuts IO uh,
00:32:33 --> 00:32:35 click on the shop link and buy yourself a
00:32:35 --> 00:32:38 pair of socks or a notebook or a,
00:32:38 --> 00:32:41 um, or a coffee cup or a hat or a
00:32:41 --> 00:32:43 hoodie, stickers. Um,
00:32:44 --> 00:32:46 there's just all this great stuff there. I've
00:32:46 --> 00:32:48 got some of it. Look, I've got my car cup
00:32:48 --> 00:32:50 here. See, here's my cup.
00:32:50 --> 00:32:53 Professor Fred Watson: Oh, that's nice. Yeah, I might
00:32:53 --> 00:32:54 have one of those somewhere.
00:32:54 --> 00:32:57 Andrew Dunkley: I probably do, yes. And I've got the tote
00:32:57 --> 00:33:00 bag as well. So we thought of that before
00:33:00 --> 00:33:03 Elon. Probably using the same company that
00:33:03 --> 00:33:04 we do. But
00:33:06 --> 00:33:08 yes. Um, I think that brings us to the end.
00:33:08 --> 00:33:10 Fred Watson, thank you so much.
00:33:10 --> 00:33:12 Professor Fred Watson: A pleasure, Andrew, good to talk. And we'll
00:33:12 --> 00:33:13 speak again.
00:33:14 --> 00:33:15 Andrew Dunkley: We will indeed.
00:33:15 --> 00:33:17 Professor Fred Watson Watson, astronomer at
00:33:17 --> 00:33:18 large, and thanks to Huw in the studio,
00:33:18 --> 00:33:20 couldn't be with us today because he wants to
00:33:20 --> 00:33:23 be the world's second trillionaire and he's
00:33:23 --> 00:33:25 just put down five bucks and he's just
00:33:25 --> 00:33:27 watching to see what happens. And from me,
00:33:27 --> 00:33:28 Andrew Dunkley, thanks for your company.
00:33:28 --> 00:33:30 We'll see you on the next episode of Space
00:33:30 --> 00:33:31 Nuts.
00:33:31 --> 00:33:31 Professor Fred Watson: Bye. Bye.
00:33:33 --> 00:33:35 Andrew Dunkley: You've been listening to the Space Nuts
00:33:35 --> 00:33:38 podcast, available at
00:33:38 --> 00:33:40 Apple Podcasts, Spotify,
00:33:40 --> 00:33:43 iHeartRadio or your favourite podcast
00:33:43 --> 00:33:44 player. You can also stream on
00:33:44 --> 00:33:47 demand@bytes.com this has been another
00:33:47 --> 00:33:49 quality podcast production from
00:33:49 --> 00:33:51 bytes.com.