From Paraplegic Astronauts to a Lemon-Shaped World: Your Daily Space Update

0:01 Avery: Hello and welcome to Astronomy Daily, the

0:03 podcast that brings you the universe one

0:05 story at a time. I'm Avery.

0:07 Anna: And I'm Anna. It's great to be with you.

0:10 Today we've got a great lineup, from a

0:13 historic first for accessibility in space

0:16 to a bizarre lemon shaped planet orbiting

0:18 a dead star.

0:20 Avery: Plus, we'll be looking at how NASA is getting

0:22 an unprecedented new view of the sun and how

0:25 future astronauts might build landing pads on

0:28 the moon itself. It's a packed show.

0:30 Anna: It certainly is. Let's get right to it.

0:33 First up, a truly inspiring story of

0:36 breaking barriers. German engineer Michaela

0:39 Benthaus just became the first paraplegic

0:42 person and the first wheelchair user to fly

0:45 to space. Wow.

0:46 Avery: That's incredible. This was with Blue Origin,

0:49 right?

0:49 Anna: That's right. On their New Shepard rocket for

0:51 a 10 minute suborbital flight. What's really

0:54 fascinating is how few adjustments were

0:56 needed. The capsule was apparently designed

0:59 with a high degree of accessibility from the

1:01 start.

1:02 Avery: That's the key, isn't it? Proactive design

1:04 rather than reactive accommodation. It, shows

1:07 that space doesn't have to be the exclusive

1:09 domain of a select few.

1:11 Anna: Exactly. Benthaus herself said she

1:13 wants to be a role model, showing that

1:15 physical limitations shouldn't prevent people

1:18 from pursuing their dreams. It's a huge step

1:20 forward for making space truly for everyone.

1:23 Avery: Absolutely. A fantastic piece of good news to

1:26 start the day.

1:28 Alright, from human spaceflight, let's turn

1:30 our attention to our own star. NASA's Punch

1:33 mission is giving us a view of the sun

1:35 that's. Well, it's completely new

1:37 punch, that stands.

1:39 Anna: For polarimeter, to unify the corona and

1:41 heliosphere. And what it's doing is pretty

1:44 revolutionary.

1:45 Avery: It is, instead of just looking at the corona,

1:48 PUNCH is watching the solar wind, the stream

1:51 of particles flowing out from the sun as it

1:53 expands and fills the solar system. It's

1:56 using a constellation of four small

1:58 spacecraft.

1:59 Anna: Mm, like a wide angle lens for the solar

2:02 system.

2:03 Avery: Exactly. They fly in formation and

2:05 together their cameras capture this

2:07 continuous panoramic view of the material as

2:10 it flows past Earth. For the first time, we

2:13 can see the entire process from the corona

2:16 to a full astronomical unit away, which is

2:19 Earth's distance from the sun.

2:20 Anna: And this is crucial for understanding space

2:23 weather. Things like coronal mass ejections

2:26 or CMEs, are massive eruptions of

2:28 plasma that can disrupt satellites and grids

2:31 here on Earth.

2:32 Avery: Right before punch, we'd see a CME

2:35 leave the sun and then we'd have to wait for

2:38 it to hit a satellite near Earth to know its

2:40 structure. Now we can track its entire

2:42 journey.

2:43 Anna: So it gives us a much better ability to

2:46 forecast the impact of space weather. It's

2:48 moving from seeing the cannon fire to

2:51 actually tracking the cannonball through the

2:53 air.

2:53 Avery: That's a perfect analogy. It's a game changer

2:56 for protecting our technology Both in orbit

2:59 and on the ground.

3:00 Anna: And the way it achieves this is so

3:02 CLE4 satellites are essentially imaging

3:05 polarized light. The sunlight scatters off

3:07 the electrons in the solar wind. And by

3:10 measuring the polarization, they can build a

3:12 3D picture of its structure and density.

3:15 Avery: It's like giving us 3D glasses to see the

3:17 invisible solar wind. And because the four

3:20 satellites are in different positions, they

3:22 can combine their views to get a truly global

3:24 perspective that a single spacecraft just

3:27 couldn't achieve.

3:28 Anna: Exactly. It's a leap from a single snapshot

3:31 To a continuous system wide movie.

3:34 This kind of data will be invaluable not just

3:36 for earth, but for planning future robotic

3:39 and crewed missions throughout the solar

3:41 system, Protecting them from solar outbursts.

3:44 Speaking of ambitious missions, Our next

3:46 story takes us to the moon, where engineers

3:48 are tackling a very dusty how to

3:51 build a launch pad that can be used over and

3:54 over again.

3:55 Avery: Right. Because rocket exhaust is

3:58 incredibly powerful, and on the moon, with

4:00 its lower gravity and lack of atmosphere, it

4:03 would just blast lunar dust or regolith

4:06 everywhere at high speeds.

4:08 Anna: Exactly. That dust is sharp and

4:11 abrasive, and it could damage the lander

4:13 itself or any nearby habitats or equipment.

4:16 So a new paper is looking at how to solve

4:19 this using the regolith.

4:20 Avery: Itself, Using the local materials. In

4:23 situ resource utilization. That's the holy

4:26 grail for sustainable space exploration.

4:29 Anna: It is. The idea is to essentially

4:31 melt the regolith Into a solid, durable

4:34 surface, A process called sintering. They're

4:37 thinking of using microwaves or lasers

4:39 Delivered by robotic builders to create these

4:42 launch pads.

4:43 Avery: So you send robots ahead to pave a landing

4:46 zone for you. That sounds very sci fi.

4:49 Anna: It does, but it's a very practical challenge.

4:51 The launch pad needs to withstand incredible

4:54 temperature swings and the stress of repeated

4:57 launches. The engineers are planning tests to

4:59 see how the sintered regolith holds up under

5:02 simulated rocket plume conditions.

5:04 Avery: And I imagine maintenance is a big issue too.

5:07 If a pad gets cracked, you can't just send

5:09 out a construction crew easily.

5:11 Anna: That's a huge part of it. The plan would have

5:13 to include robotic systems, not just for

5:15 building the pads, but for inspecting and

5:18 repairing them as well. It's a foundational

5:21 piece of the puzzle For a permanent human

5:22 presence on the moon.

5:24 Avery: It's fascinating to think about the

5:25 logistics. Are we talking about paving an

5:28 entire spaceport or just a small landing

5:31 circle?

5:31 Anna: Initially, just a hardened pad about 50

5:34 meters in diameter to mitigate the dust

5:37 problem. But the research paper suggests that

5:39 this technology is scalable. If you can build

5:42 one pad, you can link them together over time

5:45 to create taxiways and larger operational

5:47 areas.

5:48 Avery: and what about the energy source? Sensoring

5:50 regolith with lasers or microwaves Sounds

5:53 incredibly power intensive. That's a major

5:56 challenge. On the Moon, it is.

5:58 Anna: The leading concepts involve leveraging solar

6:01 power with large deployable arrays,

6:03 potentially charging batteries during the

6:05 long lunar day to power construction

6:07 activities. It's a classic chicken and egg

6:10 problem. You need infrastructure to build

6:12 infrastructure. This is step one.

6:15 Avery: Well, from building on our moon to exploring

6:18 truly bizarre worlds far beyond it,

6:21 Astronomers using the James Webb Space

6:23 Telescope have found something that. Well, it

6:26 looks like it belongs in a different

6:27 universe.

6:28 Anna: I think I know which one you're talking

6:30 about. Is this the LEMMON shaped planet?

6:32 Avery: The one and only. Its Official name is PSR

6:35 J2322

6:38 2652B. But lemon

6:40 shaped planet is much easier to remember. And

6:43 the name is literal. It's being

6:45 distorted into an oblong shape by the immense

6:48 gravity of the star it orbits.

6:50 Anna: And that star isn't a normal star. Right.

6:53 It's a pulsar. A super dense, rapidly

6:56 spinning remnant of a massive star that went

6:58 supernova.

6:59 Avery: Precisely. The gravity is so intense,

7:02 it's literally stretching the planet. But

7:04 that's not even the weirdest part. Its

7:06 atmosphere is unlike anything we've seen.

7:08 It's extremely rich in carbon.

7:11 Anna: So not a water world, but a carbon world.

7:14 What does that even mean for its appearance?

7:16 Avery: The model suggests it could have clouds of

7:19 soot and an atmosphere thick with

7:20 hydrocarbons. It's a completely alien

7:23 environment. That really challenges our

7:25 understanding of how planets can form and

7:27 what they can be made of, Especially around

7:29 such an extreme object like a pulsar.

7:32 Anna: It really is. And it raises the question of

7:35 how it even survived. The supernova that

7:37 created the pulsar should have completely

7:39 obliterated any nearby planets.

7:42 Avery: There are a couple of theories. One is that

7:44 it's a second generation planet formed from

7:47 the debris disk left over after the

7:48 supernova. The carbon rich composition might

7:51 support that idea.

7:53 Anna: Or it could have been a captured rogue planet

7:56 that wandered too close to the pulsar long

7:58 after the explosion. But getting into

8:01 such a tight orbit without being torn apart

8:04 is a tricky gravitational dance.

8:07 Avery: Either way, it's a testament to the

8:09 universe's. Ability to create stability in

8:11 the most chaotic of environments. A warped,

8:14 sooty, lemon shaped world calmly orbiting

8:17 one of the most violent objects we know of.

8:20 It's poetic in a strange way.

8:22 Anna: Incredible. Every time we think we have a

8:25 handle on the types of planets out there,

8:28 JWST finds another one to break all

8:31 the rules.

8:32 Okay, let's bring it back to our own solar

8:34 system for our last big story today, over to

8:37 the Red Planet. NASA's Perseverance

8:40 rover has been getting an up close look at

8:42 some fascinating features on the Martian

8:45 surface. Megaripples.

8:47 Avery: These aren't like the little ripples you see

8:49 in, sand at the beach, are they?

8:51 Anna: Not at all. These are huge, up to

8:53 2 meters tall. They're formed by wind,

8:56 just like dunes on Earth. But their size and

8:59 shape give us vital clues about Mars's more

9:02 recent climate history and wind patterns.

9:05 Avery: So by studying them, we can learn about the

9:07 Martian weather today and in the not so

9:09 distant past.

9:11 Anna: That's the idea. The rover has been examining

9:13 a field of them, nicknamed Honeyguide. By

9:16 analyzing the grain size and structure,

9:19 scientists can figure out the wind speeds

9:21 needed to build them. It helps paint a

9:23 picture of Mars as a dynamic, active world,

9:26 not just a static one.

9:28 Avery: It's amazing how much geology can tell us

9:31 about a planet's atmosphere, right?

9:34 Anna: But for now, from accessible spaceflight

9:37 to alien worlds, it's been quite a day in

9:40 astronomy.

9:41 Avery: It certainly has. And that's all the time we

9:43 have for this episode of Astronomy Daily. We

9:46 hope you've enjoyed this tour of the latest

9:48 cosmic happenings.

9:49 Anna: We always appreciate you joining us.

9:52 Avery: Be sure to subscribe wherever you get your

9:54 podcasts so you don't miss an episode. Until

9:56 next time. I'm Avery.

9:57 Anna: And I'm Ana. keep looking up.

10:12 Avery: The

10:12 toe.