Historic Moon Landing Attempt, AI Innovations, and the Secrets of Water Ice

0:00 Anna: Hello and welcome to Astronomy Daily, your

0:02 source for the latest news and discoveries

0:03 from the cosmos. I'm Anna and I'm thrilled to

0:06 have you join me today as we explore some

0:08 fascinating developments in space exploration

0:11 and astronomy. Coming up on today's episode,

0:14 we'll be tracking a historic moon landing

0:16 attempt as Japanese company Ispace prepares

0:18 its Resilience lander for touchdown on the

0:20 lunar surface. Then we'll look at Russia's

0:23 plans to integrate their homegrown AI system

0:25 into the International Space Station. We've

0:28 also got an incredible discovery from the

0:30 James Webb Space Telescope. And finally,

0:33 we'll get an update on SpaceX's upcoming AXE

0:35 4 mission.

0:36 So much to cover today, so let's get started

0:38 with our cosmic journey.

0:41 Tomorrow could mark a significant milestone

0:43 in the history of private space exploration

0:45 as Japanese company Ispace attempts to land

0:48 their resilient spacecraft on the moon.

0:51 This mission, scheduled for Thursday, June

0:53 5th at AH 3:24pm Eastern Time,

0:56 represents a second chance for Ispace

0:58 following their first attempt that

1:00 unfortunately ended in failure last April.

1:03 The Resilience lander, also known as Hakuto R

1:06 Mission 2, has been on quite a journey since

1:08 its January 15 launch aboard a SpaceX

1:11 Falcon 9 rocket. Unlike some lunar

1:14 missions that take a direct path, Resilience

1:16 followed what's called a low energy transfer

1:18 route to reach the moon, which is more fuel

1:21 efficient but adds months to the journey.

1:24 After this lengthy voyage, the spacecraft

1:26 finally entered lunar orbit on May 6 and

1:29 is now ready for its landing attempt.

1:32 The target landing site is in Mare Frigoris,

1:35 or the Sea of Cold, located in the northern

1:37 hemisphere of the moon's near side. It's

1:40 worth noting that this is the same general

1:42 region where Ispace tried to land during

1:45 their previous mission in 2023.

1:48 However, the company has backup plans in

1:50 place with three alternative landing sites

1:53 should conditions change, each with different

1:55 landing dates and times. For those of you

1:57 interested in watching this historic event

1:59 live, ISPACE will be broadcasting the

2:02 landing attempt on their YouTube channel. The

2:05 livestream begins at 2:10pm Eastern time,

2:08 about an hour before the scheduled touchdown.

2:10 They'll actually be offering broadcasts in

2:12 both English and Japanese, so you can choose

2:15 your preferred language. What makes this

2:18 mission particularly significant is is that

2:21 if successful, Resilience would become only

2:23 the second private spacecraft to accomplish a

2:26 soft landing on the lunar surface. The first

2:29 was achieved by Intuitive Machine's Odysseus

2:32 lander back in February, though that landing

2:35 was somewhat precarious when one of its legs

2:37 failed to deploy properly. The timing of the

2:40 landing is especially challenging because of

2:42 the 1.3 second communication delay

2:45 between Earth and the Moon. This means the

2:47 spacecraft must handle the m most critical

2:50 landing manoeuvres autonomously, adjusting to

2:52 the lunar terrain in real time, without

2:54 direct human control. Once Resilience

2:57 successfully touches down on the lunar

2:59 surface, it'll begin a relatively short but

3:02 intense mission. The lander is designed to

3:05 operate for about two weeks, essentially one

3:07 lunar day before the harsh lunar night brings

3:10 operations to an end. But don't let that

3:13 short time frame fool you. There's a lot

3:15 packed into this mission. Perhaps the most

3:18 exciting payload is the tenacious microrover,

3:20 built by Ispace's European subsidiary.

3:23 If all goes according to plan, this small

3:25 rover will deploy from the lander and begin

3:28 exploring the immediate surroundings. It's

3:30 equipped with a camera and a sample

3:32 collection shovel that will test capabilities

3:34 for future sample return missions. The rover

3:37 is also carrying something rather unusual for

3:39 a lunar mission, a work of art called Moon

3:41 House, which is a small red house designed by

3:44 Swedish artist Mikael Genberg. And in a

3:46 nod to pop culture, Resilience is also

3:49 bringing along a commemorative plate with an

3:52 inscription based on the charter of the

3:54 universal century from the popular Japanese

3:56 Gundam series.

3:59 In some rather interesting news today from

4:01 Russia, the country plans to integrate its

4:03 homegrown artificial intelligence model

4:05 called Gigachot in into the International

4:07 Space Station's IT systems.

4:10 Roscosmos chief Dmitri Bakanov announced

4:12 that the next mission to the ISS this

4:15 northern autumn will deliver everything

4:17 needed for the AI to function in space.

4:20 This isn't just about having a space based

4:22 chatbot, though. The Gigachat model will have

4:24 practical applications, specifically helping

4:27 cosmonauts process satellite imagery.

4:30 According to Bakanov, it'll increase the

4:32 maximum resolution from 1 metre per pixel to

4:35 to half a metre per pixel, which he described

4:38 as direct assistance for the cosmonauts.

4:41 Gigachat was developed by Spurbank,

4:44 Russia's largest bank, and represents one of

4:46 the country's flagship large language models.

4:49 It's part of Russia's broader efforts to

4:51 catch up with the United States and China in

4:53 what many are calling the global AI race.

4:56 The timing is interesting too, as Russia has

4:58 confirmed it will continue participating in

5:00 the ISS until 2028. Even as they

5:03 develop their own new space station. They're

5:05 planning to launch the first two modules of

5:07 that independent station in 2027.

5:10 The next Russian spacecraft mission to the

5:12 ISS is scheduled for November 27,

5:15 which is likely when this AI technology will

5:17 make its way to orbit.

5:20 Now, to what might be one of the most

5:21 exciting astronomical discoveries of the

5:24 year. Scientists have detected crystalline

5:26 water ice around a young sun like star for

5:29 the very first time. This groundbreaking

5:32 observation, made possible by the James Webb

5:34 Space Telescope, gives us direct evidence of

5:37 something astronomers have long theorised,

5:39 but never directly observed before. The, star

5:42 in question is called

5:43 HD181327,

5:46 and it's located about 155 light years away

5:49 from us. What makes this discovery so

5:52 fascinating is that this star is essentially

5:54 a baby version of our own sun, just

5:57 23 million years old compared to our sun's

5:59 mature 4.6 billion years. And unlike

6:02 our solar system,

6:03 HD181,327

6:06 is still surrounded by what's called a

6:08 protoplanetary debris disc, basically a

6:11 ring of dust and ice that hasn't yet formed

6:13 into planets. Using Webb's Near

6:16 Infrared Spectrograph, researchers from Johns

6:18 Hopkins University were able to identify

6:21 crystalline water ice in this debris disc.

6:24 This is the same type of water ice found in

6:26 Saturn's rings and in icy bodies within our

6:29 own Kuiper Belt. According to the study's

6:31 lead author, Chen Zi, this water ice

6:34 plays a vital role in planetary formation and

6:37 could eventually be delivered to terrestrial

6:39 planets that might form in this system over

6:41 the next couple hundred million years. What's

6:43 particularly interesting is the distribution

6:45 of this ice. The JWST data

6:48 shows that over 20% of the debris ring's mass

6:51 consists of water ice mixed with dust

6:53 particles, what astronomers colourfully call

6:56 dirty snowballs. This

6:59 composition is remarkably similar to our own

7:01 Kuiper Belt, and there's a clear pattern.

7:04 The closer you get to the star, the less ice

7:07 you find. At the disk's halfway

7:09 point, ice makes up only about 8% of the

7:12 material, and near the centre there's

7:15 virtually none. This pattern likely

7:17 exists because ultraviolet radiation from the

7:20 star vaporises ice in the inner

7:22 regions. It's essentially giving us a

7:25 snapshot of how water might have been

7:27 distributed in our own solar system during

7:29 its formative years, potentially helping

7:32 explain how Earth and other rocky planets

7:34 eventually obtain their water. Looking

7:37 at the distribution of this water ice in more

7:39 detail, we're seeing a fascinating pattern

7:42 that tells us a lot about how planetary

7:44 systems develop. The

7:46 JWST data shows this ice

7:49 isn't evenly spread throughout the disc. It's

7:52 heavily concentrated in the outer regions,

7:54 similar to how our own Kuiper Belt contains

7:57 most of the icy bodies in our solar system.

8:00 What's really interesting about this finding

8:02 is how it supports our understanding of

8:04 planetary formation in the outer regions,

8:06 where it's cold enough for ice to remain

8:08 stable, we see these dirty snowballs forming

8:11 mixtures of dust and ice that can eventually

8:13 clump together into larger bodies.

8:16 This process is likely how the ice giants

8:18 like Uranus and Neptune formed in our own

8:21 system. But the pattern also helps

8:23 explain one of the biggest questions in

8:25 planetary how did Earth get

8:28 its water? Since Earth formed in a region

8:31 that was probably too hot for water ice to

8:33 exist initially, scientists have long

8:36 theorised that water was delivered here later

8:38 by comets and asteroids from the outer solar

8:40 system. This observation of HD

8:43 181327

8:46 gives us a sort of snapshot of what that

8:49 early delivery system might have looked like,

8:51 with icy bodies from the outer regions

8:53 potentially migrating inward and bringing

8:55 water to the forming terrestrial planets.

8:59 Finally today, a small update. The launch of

9:02 the AXE 4 mission to the International Space

9:04 Station has been pushed back again. Axiom

9:07 Space announced just yesterday that they're

9:08 now targeting next Tuesday, June 10th at

9:11 8:22am Eastern Time for liftoff.

9:14 This is actually the second delay for this

9:16 mission in recent weeks, as it was originally

9:19 scheduled for May 29th before being moved

9:22 to June 8th and now it's been pushed back

9:24 another two days. This private

9:27 astronaut mission will fly aboard a brand new

9:29 SpaceX Crew Dragon capsule launching on a

9:32 Falcon 9 rocket from Kennedy Space Centre in

9:34 Florida. And I've got to say, the

9:37 crew lineup for this mission is particularly

9:39 noteworthy. The four person team is led by

9:42 Commander Peggy Whitson, who's honestly a

9:44 space legend at this point. She's a former

9:46 NASA astronaut who holds the American record

9:48 for most time spent in space. Now she serves

9:51 as Axiom's Director of Human Spaceflight and

9:54 this will add even more spaceflight

9:56 experience to her impressive resume. What

9:58 makes this mission truly historic though, is

10:01 the rest of the crew. The pilot is

10:03 Subhanshu Shukla of India and the mission

10:06 specialists are Slavosz Usnansky from Poland

10:09 and Tibor Kapu from Hungary.

10:11 This marks the first time that anyone from

10:14 any of these three countries, India, Poland

10:17 or Hungary will live aboard the International

10:19 Space Station. So we're looking at multiple

10:22 space firsts happening simultaneously with

10:25 this single mission. Once they reach the

10:27 station, the crew won't just be sightseeing,

10:30 they have a packed schedule with

10:32 approximately 60 different science

10:34 experiments planned during their two week

10:36 stay. After completing their mission aboard

10:38 the ISS, they'll return to Earth in the same

10:41 Dragon capsule splashing down in the Pacific

10:44 Ocean. Well, what

10:47 an exciting collection of space stories we've

10:49 covered today from ispace's second attempt at

10:52 making history with their resilience moon

10:54 landing to Russia's plans to bring AI

10:56 aboard the iss, to that fascinating

10:59 discovery of water ice around a young star

11:02 that gives us a glimpse into how our own

11:04 solar system may have formed. And finally,

11:06 the upcoming AXE 4 mission that will make

11:09 history for three different countries at

11:10 once.

11:11 This has been Astronomy Daily. I'm Anna.

11:14 Thanks so much for listening. For all our

11:16 previous episodes, head over to

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11:27 get your podcasts. Until tomorrow, keep

11:30 looking up.