From SpaceX Records to Lunar Gold Rush: Your Daily Space Update

0:00 Avery: Welcome to Astronomy Daily, the podcast that

0:02 brings you the universe one story at a time.

0:05 I'm Avery.

0:06 Anna: And I'm Anna. It's great to have you with us.

0:09 Today we'll be looking at SpaceX's

0:11 absolutely staggering launch record. A

0:14 real life tractor beam for cleaning up space

0:17 junk and the latest search for alien

0:19 signals.

0:20 Avery: Plus we'll dive into the new gold rush or

0:23 maybe m water rush on the moon. Tell you

0:26 what to look for in the night sky and solve a

0:28 celestial mystery nearly a thousand years in

0:31 the making.

0:32 Let's get started with our top story.

0:34 Anna: And it's a big one. SpaceX has once

0:37 again completely shattered their own launch

0:39 record. In 2025, the company

0:41 successfully completed

0:43 165 orbital flight.

0:46 Avery: Wow, 165. That

0:49 averages out to a launch every 2.2 days.

0:52 That pace is just incredible.

0:54 Anna: It really is. And the workhorse behind this

0:57 feat was the Falcon 9 rocket, which handled

0:59 almost all of those missions. To put it in

1:02 perspective, this number represents

1:03 represents a huge increase over their

1:05 previous years and absolutely dominates the

1:08 global launch landscape.

1:10 Avery: Right, and I'm guessing a huge chunk of those

1:13 launches were for their own project.

1:15 Anna: Exactly. The vast majority were dedicated

1:18 to building out the Starlink Internet

1:20 constellation. But it wasn't just about the

1:22 Falcon 9. The company also made significant

1:25 strides with its next generation starship

1:27 vehicle, completing several successful test

1:30 flights that bring a fully reusable heavy

1:33 lift rocket closer to reality.

1:35 Avery: It's clear they're not just leading, they're

1:37 creating a whole new league.

1:39 But all those satellites do bring up the ever

1:41 growing issue of space junk. And it seems

1:44 like every week we have some new idea on how

1:46 to deal with it. Well, here's a novel new

1:49 Some scientists are turning to science

1:51 fiction for a solution.

1:53 Anna: That's right. Researchers at the University

1:55 of Colorado Boulder are developing what

1:57 they're calling a tractor beam to help clean

2:00 up orbital debris.

2:01 Avery: A tractor beam, like in Star Trek?

2:04 Anna: That's the inspiration. But the physics is

2:06 very real. It's a non contact system.

2:09 It would use a focused electrostatic beam to

2:12 attract and move pieces of space junk without

2:15 ever physically touching them.

2:17 Avery: And that's the key part, isn't it? The non

2:19 contact aspect. Using nets or

2:22 harpoons to grab the bree runs the risk of

2:24 hitting it wrong and accidentally creating

2:26 even smaller, harder to track pieces of junk

2:29 precisely.

2:30 Anna: This electrostatic method would gently pull

2:33 the object, allowing a cleanup satellite to

2:36 guide it into a decaying orbit where it can

2:38 safely burn up in the atmosphere. The concept

2:41 is currently being tested in labs, but it's a

2:43 Very promising approach to a serious problem.

2:46 Avery: It's great to see that kind of innovative

2:48 thinking. From cleaning up our orbital

2:50 neighborhood to looking for signs of other

2:52 civilizations out there.

2:54 Our next story takes us far beyond Earth's

2:57 orbit to our recent interstellar

3:00 visitor.

3:00 Anna: Yes, astronomers, uh, conducted a highly

3:03 sensitive radio search on 3i

3:05 Atlas as it traveled through our

3:07 neighborhood. This was an interstellar

3:10 object, meaning it originated from outside

3:13 our solar system and was just passing

3:15 through. The team was looking for what are.

3:17 Avery: Called technosignatures, basically

3:20 signals that would indicate the presence of

3:22 alien technology. A, uh, transmission, a

3:24 beacon. Anything that isn't produced by

3:27 natural. Natural cosmic phenomena. So what

3:29 did they find?

3:30 Anna: Well, after sifting through the data, and

3:32 despite a few initial candidate signals that

3:35 caused some excitement, all of them were

3:37 eventually determined to be false positives.

3:40 Human generated interference from Earth. So

3:43 no alien transmissions were found. Ah, ah, I

3:46 have the shame. It might seem so, but the

3:48 project was far from a failure. The search

3:51 was actually the most sensitive of its kind

3:54 ever conducted on an interstellar object.

3:57 It sets a new standard and a powerful new

4:00 benchmark for how to conduct these searches

4:02 in the future when the next interstellar

4:04 visitor comes calling.

4:06 Avery: That makes sense. We learn and refine the

4:08 process with each attempt.

4:09 And while we're searching the far reaches of

4:11 space for others, there's a new kind of space

4:14 race heating up much, much closer to home.

4:16 Anna: That's right, Avery. There's a growing and

4:19 increasingly urgent international race to

4:21 mine the moon. Various countries and private

4:24 companies are actively developing the

4:26 technology needed to extract valu lunar

4:29 resources.

4:30 Avery: And we're not just talking about rocks. The

4:32 big prizes are resources like water ice,

4:34 which is critical for life support and can be

4:37 broken down into hydrogen and oxygen for

4:39 rocket fuel, and an isotope called helium

4:42 3, which is rare on Earth, but could be a

4:45 fuel for future fusion reactors. Mhm.

4:48 Anna: And the list of players is growing. We have

4:50 space agencies and Companies from the U.S.

4:53 china, Australia, Japan and Europe,

4:56 all working on lunar excavation and resource

4:58 extraction technologies.

5:00 Avery: But there's a major hurdle, and it's not a

5:02 technical one.

5:03 Anna: Exactly. The international legal framework

5:06 for this is dangerously outdated. The Outer

5:09 Space Treaty of 1967 forbids

5:12 any nation from claiming sovereignty over a

5:14 celestial body. But it's completely silent on

5:17 the issue of commercial resource extraction.

5:20 Avery: So it's a bit like the Wild west on the final

5:22 frontier. There are urgent calls from legal

5:24 experts and diplomats to establish clear

5:27 modern international rules to prevent

5:29 conflict and ensure that lunar mining is done

5:32 responsibly. Responsibly and sustainably.

5:33 Anna: It's a Conversation that needs to happen

5:36 quickly.

5:36 Well, while nations plan their lunar futures,

5:39 the rest of us can look up and enjoy some

5:41 amazing celestial events right from our own

5:44 backyards. Avery, what should we be looking

5:46 for in the night sky?

5:48 Avery: There's plenty to see as we head into the new

5:50 year, particularly for our Northern

5:52 Hemisphere listeners. For starters, on

5:54 January 1, the brightest star in our night

5:56 sky, Sirius, will be at its highest point in

5:59 the sky around midnight, making it a

6:01 brilliant sight.

6:02 Anna: And what about the moon?

6:03 Avery: We'll have three full moons before the spring

6:06 equinox, and the third one on March 3rd is

6:08 special. It will feature a total lunar

6:11 eclipse, which will be at least partially

6:12 visible across most of the United States. So

6:15 mark your calendars for that.

6:16 Anna: Ooh, I will. Any planets putting on a show?

6:20 Avery: Absolutely. The giant of our solar system,

6:22 Jupiter, is at opposition. That means Earth

6:25 is passing directly between Jupiter and the

6:27 Sun. So the planet will be visible all night

6:29 long and at its brightest for the year. And

6:31 for the early evening skywatchers, Venus is

6:34 making its return as the brilliant evening

6:36 star.

6:37 Anna: Wonderful. Plenty to look forward to. It's

6:40 amazing to look up and see these events

6:42 happening now.

6:43 But our final story today, Avery, is about

6:45 solving a cosmic mystery that's almost a

6:48 thousand years old.

6:50 Avery: That's right. Astronomers believe they

6:52 finally figured out the puzzle of a supernova

6:54 remnant known as PA30. Historical

6:57 records from Chinese and Japanese astronomers

6:59 in the year 1181 noted a new guest

7:02 star in the sky that was visible for six

7:04 months. Scientists have long suspected PA30

7:07 was the leftover cloud from that event.

7:10 Anna: And now they know what caused it. It turns

7:12 out this was an extremely rare type of

7:15 stellar explosion. What they call A failed

7:18 type 1ax supernova.

7:20 Avery: A failed supernova. So the star didn't

7:23 completely blow itself to bits?

7:25 Anna: Exactly. The explosion wasn't powerful enough

7:28 to completely obliterate the star. Instead,

7:30 a surviving white dwarf star behind

7:33 at the center of the remnant. And this

7:36 survivor is doing something incredible.

7:38 Avery: Mhm. And that explains the remnant's weird

7:41 shape, Right? Most supernova remnants are

7:44 chaotic, messy clouds of gas and dust.

7:47 Pay 30 is different. It has these strange

7:50 almost straight filaments.

7:52 Anna: That's the key. The surviving white dwarf

7:55 at the center is emitting an extremely fast

7:57 stellar wind. Material flowing outwards at

8:00 the thousands of kilometers per second. It's

8:03 this incredibly fast, powerful wind that

8:06 is shaping the nebula, creating those unique

8:09 straight line filaments. It's a fantastic

8:12 piece of cosmic detective work.

8:14 Avery: And that's a wrap on another star studded

8:16 collection of stories for today from record

8:19 breaking launches to thousand year old

8:21 stellar mysteries. The universe never fails

8:24 to fascinate.

8:25 Anna: It certainly doesn't. A uh, huge thank you to

8:28 all of you for tuning in to Astronomy Daily.

8:30 We hope you'll join us again next time for

8:32 another journey through the cosmos. And we

8:35 hope you'll visit our website at

8:36 astronomydaily IO for even more

8:39 space news and our full catalog of back

8:41 episodes.

8:42 Avery: Until tomorrow, this has been Avery and.

8:45 Anna: Anna reminding you to always keep looking

8:48 up.

8:59 The stories.

9:08 We told.

9:12 Avery: M.