Countdown to the Moon: Artemis II Crew in Quarantine

0:00 Speaker 1: Hello, and welcome to Astronomy Daily.

0:03 Speaker 2: I'm Anna and I'm Avery. It is Saturday, February twenty first,

0:07 Speaker 2: twenty twenty six, and you are locked in for Season five,

0:10 Speaker 2: episode forty five. We have got a packed show for

0:13 Speaker 2: you today.

0:14 Speaker 1: We really do. We are just two weeks away from

0:18 Speaker 1: what could be one of the most significant launches in

0:20 Speaker 1: the history of human spaceflight, and the crew is now

0:24 Speaker 1: officially in quarantine. Humanity is going back to the Moon.

0:28 Speaker 2: People beyond the Moon actually for the first time since

0:32 Speaker 2: nineteen seventy two. We'll have the full artemis to update

0:35 Speaker 2: in just a moment. Plus, scientists may be challenging the

0:39 Speaker 2: very foundations of dark matter theory. There's a solar storm

0:43 Speaker 2: brewing that could light up disguise as early as tomorrow.

0:45 Speaker 1: Night Mars is holding water a lot closer to home

0:49 Speaker 1: than we thought. Great moves if you're planning to move there.

0:53 Speaker 1: And astronomers have confirmed that super massive black holes are

0:57 Speaker 1: not content with just destroying their own galones. Apparently they've

1:02 Speaker 1: been going after the neighbors too.

1:04 Speaker 2: Serial killers of the Cosmos. We'll explain, and we'll wrap

1:08 Speaker 2: up with a SpaceX story that came very close their

1:12 Speaker 2: words not ours to being a very bad day.

1:15 Speaker 1: Let's get into it, all right, Let's.

1:17 Speaker 2: Start with the big one. As of yesterday evening, Friday,

1:20 Speaker 2: February twentieth, twenty twenty six, the four astronauts of NASA's

1:25 Speaker 2: Artemis two mission have officially entered quarantine in Houston, Texas.

1:29 Speaker 1: And if you know anything about space mission protocols, entering

1:33 Speaker 1: quarantine is one of the clearest signals you can get

1:36 Speaker 1: that a launch is genuinely imminent. BASA is targeting no

1:40 Speaker 1: earlier than Friday, March sixth, and that clock is now ticking.

1:44 Speaker 2: So let's set the scene for anyone who needs a

1:47 Speaker 2: quick refresher. Artemis two is the second mission of NASA's

1:51 Speaker 2: Artemis program, and it will be the first crude mission

1:54 Speaker 2: to travel beyond Low Earth orbit since Apollo seventeen back

1:59 Speaker 2: in December nineteen seventy two. We're talking more than fifty years.

2:04 Speaker 1: Fifty three years to be precise, and the crew that

2:07 Speaker 1: will make this historic journey consists of four astronauts Commander

2:12 Speaker 1: Reid Wiseman, pilot Victor Glover, and Mission Specialist Christina Cock

2:17 Speaker 1: from NASA and Mission Specialist Jeremy Hansen from the Canadian

2:21 Speaker 1: Space Agency.

2:23 Speaker 2: They entered quarantine at approximately five pm local time on

2:26 Speaker 2: Friday evening in Houston. The quarantine period is typically about

2:30 Speaker 2: fourteen days, during which the crew limits their exposure to

2:33 Speaker 2: other people to make sure they stay in good health

2:36 Speaker 2: before launch. They'll fly down to Kennedy Space Center in

2:39 Speaker 2: Florida about five days before launch day.

2:42 Speaker 1: And the reason NASA is feeling confident enough to put

2:45 Speaker 1: them into quarantine now is the success of the second

2:48 Speaker 1: wet dress rehearsal, which took place on Thursday, February nineteenth. Now, avery,

2:54 Speaker 1: for the uninitiated, what exactly is a wet dress rehearsal?

2:58 Speaker 2: Great question. A wet dress rehearsal is essentially a full

3:02 Speaker 2: dress rehearsal of launch day, except you don't actually light

3:05 Speaker 2: the engines. At the end, the team slowed the rocket

3:08 Speaker 2: with its full complement of cryogenic propellants in the case

3:12 Speaker 2: of the Space Launch System, that's more than seven hundred

3:15 Speaker 2: thousand gallons of super cold liquid hydrogen and liquid oxygen,

3:19 Speaker 2: and then run through the entire launch countdown sequence right

3:23 Speaker 2: down to the final seconds.

3:24 Speaker 1: And the reason they needed a second rehearsal was that

3:28 Speaker 1: the first attempt on February third had to be called

3:31 Speaker 1: off when a hydrogen leak was detected. Engineers replaced seals

3:35 Speaker 1: and a filter in the ground support equipment, and on

3:38 Speaker 1: Thursday night they ran the whole thing again, and this

3:42 Speaker 1: time hydrogen concentrations stayed within safe limits throughout.

3:46 Speaker 2: They actually ran through the terminal countdown the final ten

3:49 Speaker 2: minutes twice. The test concluded at ten to sixteen Eastern Time,

3:54 Speaker 2: stopping at T minus twenty nine seconds as planned. Now

3:57 Speaker 2: there was a minor communications glitch in the l launch

4:00 Speaker 2: control center that cause a brief delay early in the test,

4:03 Speaker 2: and a booster avionics voltage anomaly that paused a terminal

4:07 Speaker 2: countdown for a short time, but both were resolved and

4:10 Speaker 2: NASA declared the rehearsal a success.

4:13 Speaker 1: So what happens next. Data from the rehearsal is being reviewed.

4:18 Speaker 1: There's final work to complete at the launch pad, including

4:21 Speaker 1: retesting the flight termination system, and then a flight readiness

4:26 Speaker 1: review has to take place before a formal launch date

4:29 Speaker 1: can be set, but all signs are pointing to March sixth.

4:33 Speaker 2: Launch windows for lunar missions are quite tight by the

4:36 Speaker 2: way they're determined by the alignment of the Earth and Moon,

4:40 Speaker 2: so you can't just pick any day. The available windows

4:43 Speaker 2: are March sixth through ninth, with an additional opportunity on

4:46 Speaker 2: March eleventh.

4:48 Speaker 1: If Artemis two launches successfully, it will send four human

4:52 Speaker 1: beings on a ten day journey around the Moon using

4:56 Speaker 1: a free return trajectory, meaning that even if the in

5:00 Speaker 1: spacecraft's propulsion system doesn't perform as planned, the crew will

5:04 Speaker 1: still safely return to Earth they splash down in the

5:07 Speaker 1: Pacific Ocean.

5:09 Speaker 2: It will not orbit the Moon or land. That's Artemis

5:12 Speaker 2: three's job. But it will take people further from Earth

5:15 Speaker 2: than any humans have been in over half a century.

5:17 Speaker 2: And that is extraordinary, it really is.

5:21 Speaker 1: We will be following every step of this one very closely.

5:25 Speaker 1: March sixth, people mark your calendars.

5:29 Speaker 2: Now, from the very near future to the very deep past.

5:33 Speaker 2: Cosmologists have spent decades trying to understand dark matter, the

5:37 Speaker 2: mysterious invisible substance that appears to make up about twenty

5:41 Speaker 2: seven percent of the universe and which we've never directly detected,

5:45 Speaker 2: and a new paper just published in Physical Review D

5:48 Speaker 2: is making a bold claim.

5:51 Speaker 1: Bold claim is something of an understatement. The authors say

5:54 Speaker 1: their findings represent and I want to make sure I

5:57 Speaker 1: get this, right, the first step towards the end of

6:01 Speaker 1: dark matter theory.

6:03 Speaker 2: That's a sentence that would cause an awkward silence at

6:06 Speaker 2: a cosmology conference.

6:08 Speaker 1: I imagine. So, so what are they actually seeing. The paper

6:12 Speaker 1: reports the discovery of a significant number of new baryonic

6:16 Speaker 1: dark matter signals. Now, baryonic matter is essentially ordinary matter,

6:22 Speaker 1: the stuff made of protons, neutrons, and electrons, the kind

6:25 Speaker 1: of matter that makes up you, me, planets, stars, everything

6:30 Speaker 1: we can see and touch.

6:32 Speaker 2: Right, and the conventional model of dark matter says that

6:35 Speaker 2: the mysterious missing mass in the universe is made of

6:38 Speaker 2: something else, entirely non baryonic matter, exotic particles that don't

6:43 Speaker 2: interact with light, which is why we can't see it directly.

6:46 Speaker 2: We infer its existence from its gravitational effects on galaxies.

6:51 Speaker 1: So if these researchers are finding that a lot of

6:54 Speaker 1: what we've been attributing to exotic dark matter can actually

6:58 Speaker 1: be explained by ordinary barrieric matter that we just hadn't

7:02 Speaker 1: accounted for properly, that's a very significant challenge to the

7:06 Speaker 1: standard model.

7:07 Speaker 2: Now, to be clear, the paper doesn't claim dark matter

7:10 Speaker 2: doesn't exist. It claims this is the beginning of the

7:13 Speaker 2: end of dark matter theory as it currently stands. Whether

7:17 Speaker 2: that means a revision or a revolution, we'll have to

7:20 Speaker 2: wait and see.

7:21 Speaker 1: This is the kind of paper that will generate a

7:23 Speaker 1: lot of discussion in the community over the coming months.

7:26 Speaker 1: We'll be keeping a close eye on the responses and

7:29 Speaker 1: follow up research. Fascinating stuff.

7:32 Speaker 2: Now, a very timely heads up for all you skywatchers

7:35 Speaker 2: out there, and by timely, I mean you may want

7:38 Speaker 2: to check your local forecast for tomorrow night. That's right.

7:41 Speaker 1: Space weather forecasters are currently tracking a large coronal hole

7:46 Speaker 1: on the Sun that has rotated into what's called a

7:49 Speaker 1: geo effective position, beaning it is now pointing directly at Earth.

7:54 Speaker 2: So a coronal hole is a region on the Sun

7:57 Speaker 2: where the magnetic field lines open outward rather than looping

8:00 Speaker 2: back in. That configuration allows fast moving solar wind to

8:05 Speaker 2: escape directly into space, and when that fast solar wind

8:08 Speaker 2: is aimed at us, it can interact with Earth's magnetic

8:11 Speaker 2: field and trigger geomagnetic storms.

8:14 Speaker 1: And geomagnetic storms are what drive auroras the northern and

8:19 Speaker 1: southern lights. The effects from this particular coronal hole are

8:23 Speaker 1: currently expected to arrive around February twenty second that's tomorrow.

8:28 Speaker 1: Forecasters are predicting the solar wind interaction could disturb Earth's

8:33 Speaker 1: magnetic field and boost Aurora activity.

8:36 Speaker 2: Conditions today are relatively quiet. The Corona hole driven effects

8:40 Speaker 2: from a previous solar windstream are fading, but tomorrow night

8:44 Speaker 2: could be a different story. If you're in higher latitude

8:47 Speaker 2: regions northern parts of the US, Canada, the UK, Scandinavia,

8:53 Speaker 2: southern New Zealand and Australia, it's worth watching the skies

8:57 Speaker 2: after dark.

8:58 Speaker 1: We should also mention that in the past few days

9:01 Speaker 1: earth Sky has been tracking some very dramatic solar features

9:05 Speaker 1: twin prominences visible on opposite sides of the Sun simultaneously

9:10 Speaker 1: glowing in data from the Goughs nineteen satellite. Solar activity

9:15 Speaker 1: is really putting on a show right now. We're deep

9:18 Speaker 1: in solar cycle twenty five, and the Sun is reminding

9:21 Speaker 1: us whose boss.

9:22 Speaker 2: Keep an eye on spaceweather dot com and earth Sky

9:25 Speaker 2: for live updates as that solar wind approaches, and fingers

9:29 Speaker 2: crossed for clear skies.

9:31 Speaker 1: All right, let's head to the Red planet. If there's

9:34 Speaker 1: one resource that will make or break any long term

9:37 Speaker 1: human presence on Mars, it's water. You need it for drinking,

9:42 Speaker 1: for growing food, for producing rocket fuel, and new research

9:46 Speaker 1: is suggesting that accessible water ice on Mars may be

9:49 Speaker 1: closer to the equator than scientists previously believed.

9:54 Speaker 2: This matters enormously from an exploration standpoint. When we talk

9:58 Speaker 2: about water ice on Mars, we typically think of the poles.

10:02 Speaker 2: There are substantial ice caps that both Martian poles, and

10:05 Speaker 2: they're well documented. But the poles are extremely difficult to reach,

10:10 Speaker 2: they're incredibly cold, and they fall under strict planetary protection

10:14 Speaker 2: protocols because of the possibility of contaminating any potential microbial life.

10:19 Speaker 1: So the ideal scenario for human explorers and for rovers

10:24 Speaker 1: doing science has always been to find water ice at

10:27 Speaker 1: lower latitudes, closer to the equator, where temperatures are more

10:31 Speaker 1: manageable and landing is easier, and this new research from

10:35 Speaker 1: a paper published in Acta Astronautica, suggests that may be

10:39 Speaker 1: more achievable than we thought. The researchers propose new methods

10:44 Speaker 1: for dealing with one of the key challenges of equatorial

10:47 Speaker 1: water ice extraction, the jagged, clingy nature of Martian regolith

10:51 Speaker 1: or lunar dust. Martian dust gets into everything and they

10:56 Speaker 1: describe flexible electrodynamic dust shields that could help manage the

11:01 Speaker 1: dust problem and make water extraction at equatorial sites more viable.

11:06 Speaker 1: So the picture is increasingly optimistic for Mars exploration. If

11:10 Speaker 1: future missions can confirm accessible ice deposits at mid latitudes

11:15 Speaker 1: and develop the technology to extract and process that water efficiently,

11:20 Speaker 1: a long term human presence on Mars becomes significantly more realistic.

11:25 Speaker 2: One step at a time, but each of these steps

11:27 Speaker 2: matters really encouraging research.

11:30 Speaker 1: Now, I mentioned in the intro that super massive black

11:34 Speaker 1: holes have been going after the neighbors. Let me explain

11:37 Speaker 1: what I mean by that, because the new research here

11:40 Speaker 1: is genuinely striking.

11:42 Speaker 2: We've known for some time that active super massive black holes.

11:46 Speaker 2: The kind found that the centers of galaxies that are

11:49 Speaker 2: actively feeding on material can have a profound effect on

11:53 Speaker 2: their host galaxy. Specifically, they can heat and disperse gas,

11:57 Speaker 2: shutting down the conditions needed for new stars to form. Effectively,

12:02 Speaker 2: they can kill their own galaxy.

12:04 Speaker 1: But astronomers have now found evidence that the most luminous

12:08 Speaker 1: of these, called quasars, don't stop there. New research using

12:12 Speaker 1: data from the James Web telescope shows that the powerful

12:16 Speaker 1: radiation and outflows of quasars can suppress star formation in

12:21 Speaker 1: neighboring galaxies as well, galaxies that aren't even directly hosting

12:25 Speaker 1: the black hole.

12:27 Speaker 2: They're basically firing across the cosmic neighborhood. The energy output

12:31 Speaker 2: of an active quasar is so immense that its effects

12:34 Speaker 2: can extend beyond its own galaxy and reach into surrounding systems,

12:38 Speaker 2: cutting off the gas supply those nearby galaxies need to

12:41 Speaker 2: form new stars.

12:43 Speaker 1: Researchers are now calling them super massive serial killers, and honestly,

12:48 Speaker 1: given what the data shows, that label feels pretty accurate.

12:52 Speaker 1: What's particularly significant is the implication for our understanding of

12:56 Speaker 1: galaxy evolution. If black holes can shape not just their

12:59 Speaker 1: home post galaxies, but entire cosmic neighborhoods, that's a much

13:04 Speaker 1: bigger role than we previously appreciated.

13:07 Speaker 2: The James Webb Space Telescope continues to rewrite the textbooks.

13:11 Speaker 2: This research adds another compelling chapter to the story of

13:14 Speaker 2: how these extraordinary objects have helped sculpt the large scale

13:18 Speaker 2: structure of the universe we.

13:19 Speaker 1: See today, terrifying and magnificent in equal measure, which is

13:24 Speaker 1: kind of the theme of black hole research generally.

13:27 Speaker 2: And finally, let's end on a story that's part triumph,

13:30 Speaker 2: part nailbider. On Thursday, February nineteenth, SpaceX launched twenty nine

13:35 Speaker 2: Starling satellites from Cape Canaveral and successfully landed the Falcon

13:40 Speaker 2: nine first stage booster, not at their usual landing zones

13:43 Speaker 2: in Florida or their drone ships in the Atlantic or Pacific,

13:46 Speaker 2: but in the Bahamas.

13:48 Speaker 1: Now, this is only the second time ever that SpaceX

13:51 Speaker 1: has landed a Falcon nine booster in the Bahamas. The

13:54 Speaker 1: first time was not very long ago, so this is

13:57 Speaker 1: still very much a novelty. And what made this this

14:00 Speaker 1: one particularly dramatic was the quote that came out of

14:03 Speaker 1: SpaceX after the landing.

14:05 Speaker 2: Yes, someone at SpaceX said, and I quote, we almost

14:09 Speaker 2: did have a really terrible.

14:11 Speaker 1: Day, which is not the kind of post launch statement

14:14 Speaker 1: that fills you with warmth and reassurance. SpaceX haven't elaborated

14:18 Speaker 1: extensively on what almost went wrong, but the fact that

14:21 Speaker 1: the booster landed safely is obviously the key outcome here.

14:25 Speaker 2: The Bahamas landing site gives SpaceX more flexibility for certain

14:28 Speaker 2: orbital trajectories, particularly for Starlink missions launching from Cape Canaveral,

14:33 Speaker 2: where the geometry of the orbit makes a Bahamas landing

14:36 Speaker 2: more efficient than trying to bring the booster all the

14:38 Speaker 2: way back to Florida.

14:40 Speaker 1: SpaceX have now launched and landed hundreds of Falcon nine boosters.

14:44 Speaker 1: The reusability program has fundamentally transformed the economics of spaceflight,

14:49 Speaker 1: but moments like this are a reminder that rocket recovery,

14:53 Speaker 1: even after hundreds of successful attempts, still demands total precision

14:58 Speaker 1: every single time.

15:00 Speaker 2: Every landing is a controlled miracle when you think about it.

15:03 Speaker 2: Very glad this one worked out. Congratulations to the SpaceX team, and.

15:08 Speaker 1: That is your Astronomy Daily for Saturday, February twenty first,

15:11 Speaker 1: twenty twenty six. What a lineup. Artemis two on the

15:15 Speaker 1: launchpad with the crew in quarantine, dark matter theory under pressure,

15:20 Speaker 1: solar storms heading our way, water on Mars getting more accessible,

15:24 Speaker 1: black holes on a neighborhood killing spree, and a SpaceX

15:28 Speaker 1: rocket making only its second ever Bahama's landing. Not a

15:31 Speaker 1: bad day's news from the Cosmos.

15:34 Speaker 2: If you enjoyed today's episode, please subscribe wherever you get

15:37 Speaker 2: your podcasts. Leave us a review. It really does help

15:40 Speaker 2: the show grow and share us with a fellow space enthusiast.

15:43 Speaker 2: You can find all our show notes, links, and more

15:46 Speaker 2: over at Astronomy Daily dot io, and follow us on

15:49 Speaker 2: social media at astro Daily Pod.

15:51 Speaker 1: We'll be back Monday with more of the universe's finest headlines.

15:55 Speaker 1: Until then, keep looking up.

15:57 Speaker 2: And stay curious. Everyone, take care.

16:00 Speaker 3: The story day, Star is the Toll. The Star is

16:12 Speaker 3: the Toll.

16:19 Speaker 2: Story is the so