Love Is in the Stars

0:00 Speaker 1: Happy Valentine's Day, everyone. Welcome to Astronomy Daily, the podcast

0:05 Speaker 1: that brings you the latest space and astronomy news every

0:08 Speaker 1: single day.

0:09 Speaker 2: I'm Anna and I'm Avery, and what a day to

0:13 Speaker 2: be talking about the Cosmo Xana. The universe has really

0:15 Speaker 2: pulled out all the stops for Valentine's Day.

0:17 Speaker 1: This year, it really has. We've got astronauts arriving at

0:21 Speaker 1: the space station today, a dying star sending the universe

0:25 Speaker 1: a literal Valentine, possible Aurora dancing across the skies tonight,

0:30 Speaker 1: and a whole lot more. So let's get into.

0:32 Speaker 2: It ready when you are.

0:35 Speaker 1: Our top story today is a Valentine's Day rendezvous, not

0:38 Speaker 1: between sweethearts, but between a Dragon spacecraft and the International

0:43 Speaker 1: Space Station facex's Crew twelve mission launched yesterday morning at

0:48 Speaker 1: Cape Canaveral at five point fifteen Eastern time, and as

0:52 Speaker 1: we speak, four astronauts are on their way to dock

0:55 Speaker 1: with the ISS later this afternoon.

0:58 Speaker 2: And what a crew it is. Commanding the mission is

1:00 Speaker 2: NASA astronaut Jessicamir with Jack Hathaway as pilot. They're joined

1:05 Speaker 2: by ISSA astronaut Sophie Adenat, whose mission has been named

1:08 Speaker 2: Epsilon and Ross Cosmos cosmonaut Andre Fetiyev. It's a truly

1:13 Speaker 2: international crew.

1:15 Speaker 1: This mission has been particularly urgent avery the ISS has

1:19 Speaker 1: been operating with just three crew members, a skeleton crew

1:23 Speaker 1: since mid January, when Crew eleven had to make an

1:26 Speaker 1: unexpected early return to Earth due to a medical issue

1:29 Speaker 1: with one of its members.

1:31 Speaker 2: That left NASA astronaut Chris Williams and two Russian cosmonauts

1:35 Speaker 2: Sergei kutz Verskov and Sergei Mikhayev, holding down the four

1:38 Speaker 2: under own. NASA has been clear that seven crew members

1:42 Speaker 2: is really what you need to maximize a science output

1:45 Speaker 2: on a station that costs around three billion dollars a

1:48 Speaker 2: year to operate.

1:49 Speaker 1: So there was real pressure to get this launch done quickly.

1:52 Speaker 1: SpaceX actually had the rocket and spacecraft ready ahead of schedule,

1:57 Speaker 1: but crew training and weather kept pushing the date. They

2:00 Speaker 1: lost two launch windows earlier in the week to bad

2:03 Speaker 1: weather along a flight path before finally getting off the

2:06 Speaker 1: ground yesterday.

2:08 Speaker 2: And in a lovely touch for Valentine's Day, the crew

2:11 Speaker 2: revealed their zero gravity indicator, a handmade crocheted model of

2:15 Speaker 2: Earth with four little satellites representing each crew member. Plus

2:19 Speaker 2: a tiny moon for Commander Mer. It was made by

2:22 Speaker 2: Mer's childhood best friend and Hathaway's daughter. That's pretty adorable,

2:27 Speaker 2: it really is.

2:28 Speaker 1: Docking is expected at around three point fifteen pm Eastern

2:32 Speaker 1: Time today, so by the time many of you are

2:34 Speaker 1: listening to this, the ISS should be back to its

2:37 Speaker 1: full complement of seven. NASA Administrator Jared Isaacman praised the teams,

2:43 Speaker 1: saying they brought Crew eleven home early, pulled Crew twelve forward,

2:47 Speaker 1: and did it all while preparing for the Artemis two

2:50 Speaker 1: moon mission. A busy few weeks at NASA, to say

2:53 Speaker 1: the least.

2:54 Speaker 2: And speaking of the Artemis to rocket, there was a

2:57 Speaker 2: fantastic photo from Kennedy Space Center this week showing the

3:01 Speaker 2: massive SLS Moon rocket photo bombing the Crew twelve Falcon

3:04 Speaker 2: nine on the neighboring launch pad, two very different rockets

3:09 Speaker 2: side by side, representing the present and future of human spaceflight.

3:13 Speaker 1: Now we've been keeping you updated on this one, but

3:16 Speaker 1: with just three days to go, it's time for a

3:19 Speaker 1: final reminder. On Tuesday, February seventeenth, the first solar eclipse

3:24 Speaker 1: of twenty twenty six will take place. An annular solar

3:27 Speaker 1: eclipse or also known as a ring of fire eclipse.

3:31 Speaker 2: And here's the thing. This one is going to be

3:34 Speaker 2: witnessed by more penguins than people. The path of annularity,

3:38 Speaker 2: where you'd actually see that stunning ring of sunlight around

3:41 Speaker 2: the Moon, cuts across a remote stretch of Antarctica and

3:44 Speaker 2: the Southern Ocean.

3:46 Speaker 1: At maximum eclipse, the Moon will cover about ninety six

3:49 Speaker 1: percent of the Sun's disc, leaving that slim glowing ring

3:53 Speaker 1: visible for up to two minutes and twenty seconds. But

3:56 Speaker 1: you'd need to be at one of the scientific research

3:59 Speaker 1: stations down in Antarctica, like the French Italian Concordia Station

4:03 Speaker 1: or Russia's Myrni station.

4:05 Speaker 2: For the rest of the world, partial phases will be

4:08 Speaker 2: visible from the very southern tips of Chile and Argentina

4:12 Speaker 2: and the cross parts of Southern Africa, including South Africa,

4:16 Speaker 2: Mozambique and Madagascar. But if you're in Europe, North America

4:21 Speaker 2: or most of Asia, no dice on this one. I'm

4:23 Speaker 2: afraid Bill.

4:25 Speaker 1: It's a reminder that eclipse season is upon us, and

4:28 Speaker 1: that brings us neatly to our next story.

4:30 Speaker 2: Have you ever noticed that solar eclipses and lunar eclipses

4:34 Speaker 2: seem to arrive in pairs. It's not a coincidence. Every

4:38 Speaker 2: eclipse is part of a predictable pattern during a short

4:41 Speaker 2: window known as an eclipse season.

4:43 Speaker 1: That's right. An eclipse season lasts about thirty one to

4:47 Speaker 1: thirty seven days, and there are typically two each year,

4:50 Speaker 1: roughly six months apart. They occur when the Sun passes

4:54 Speaker 1: near one of the lunar nodes, the points where the

4:56 Speaker 1: Moon's tilted orbit crosses the plane of Earth's orbit around

5:00 Speaker 1: the Sun. During this window, the geometry lines up for

5:03 Speaker 1: eclipses to.

5:04 Speaker 2: Happen, and because the window is long enough to contain

5:07 Speaker 2: both a new moon and a full moon, which are

5:09 Speaker 2: always about two weeks apart, you almost always get a pair,

5:13 Speaker 2: a solar eclipse at new moon and the lunar eclipse

5:16 Speaker 2: at full moon, or vice versa.

5:18 Speaker 1: So the annular solar eclipse on February seventeenth is the

5:22 Speaker 1: opening act. Exactly fourteen days later, on March third, the

5:26 Speaker 1: same eclipse season delivers a total lunar eclipse, a blood moon,

5:30 Speaker 1: with the Moon spending nearly an hour fully inside Earth's

5:34 Speaker 1: dark umbrel.

5:35 Speaker 2: Shadow, and that one is much more accessible observers in

5:39 Speaker 2: East Asia Australia. The Pacific and western North America will

5:43 Speaker 2: have excellent views of the Moon turning that gorgeous coppery

5:47 Speaker 2: color during flatality.

5:48 Speaker 1: But wait, there's more. The second eclipse season of twenty

5:51 Speaker 1: twenty six arrives in August, and this one is the blockbuster.

5:56 Speaker 1: On August twelfth, a total solar eclipse will sweep across Greenland, Iceland,

6:01 Speaker 1: and northern Spain. That's the first total solar eclipse since

6:05 Speaker 1: April twenty twenty four, and much of Western Europe and

6:08 Speaker 1: North America will see at least a deep partial eclipse.

6:12 Speaker 2: Then two weeks after that, on August twenty eighth, a

6:16 Speaker 2: partial lunar eclipse rounds out the season. So twenty twenty

6:20 Speaker 2: six really is shaping up to be a remarkable year

6:22 Speaker 2: for eclipse chasers, for eclipses, two seasons, and some genuinely

6:27 Speaker 2: spectacular events. If you've been meeting to plan an eclipse trip,

6:31 Speaker 2: now's the time.

6:32 Speaker 1: We'll have much more on the March and August eclipses

6:34 Speaker 1: as they get closer, so stay tuned.

6:36 Speaker 2: And now for what has to be the most perfectly

6:39 Speaker 2: timed astronomy story of the year. Just in time for

6:42 Speaker 2: Valentine's Day, Space has sent us a heart shaped greeting.

6:46 Speaker 1: The star Mira A, about three hundred light years from Earth,

6:50 Speaker 1: has ejected a cloud of gas and dust that forms

6:53 Speaker 1: a striking heart shape around it. And this isn't just

6:56 Speaker 1: a pretty picture, it's a genuinely surprising science discovery.

7:01 Speaker 2: Mira A is a red giant star, one of the

7:03 Speaker 2: most famous variable stars in the sky. It was first

7:07 Speaker 2: documented all the way back in fifteen ninety six as

7:11 Speaker 2: a star. In the last stages of its life, it's

7:13 Speaker 2: been shedding material into space, but the amount and speed

7:17 Speaker 2: of this particular rejection caught astronomers off guard.

7:20 Speaker 1: The study, led by Theo Corey at Sweden's Chalmers University

7:24 Speaker 1: of Technology, found that Mira A ejected roughly seven earth

7:28 Speaker 1: masses of material in this burst. Using observations from both

7:32 Speaker 1: the Very Large Telescope and the Alma radio array in Chile,

7:37 Speaker 1: the team discovered that gas fills the heart shaped structure,

7:40 Speaker 1: while dust concentrates along the outer edges, creating a beautiful

7:45 Speaker 1: glowing outline.

7:46 Speaker 2: What's particularly fascinating is that the star appears to be

7:50 Speaker 2: acting like a lighthouse, illuminating its surroundings unevenly. Corey said

7:55 Speaker 2: that they were very surprised to see the structure, and

7:57 Speaker 2: that the star's illumination of the surrounding us varies in

8:01 Speaker 2: unexpected ways.

8:02 Speaker 1: And there's a companion star in this love story too.

8:06 Speaker 1: Mira B, a white dwarf star that orbits Mira A,

8:09 Speaker 1: is already beginning to gather some of the ejected material.

8:13 Speaker 1: The researchers say they'll keep monitoring the expanding cloud because

8:17 Speaker 1: it could eventually affect Mira B. Though we've got a

8:20 Speaker 1: cosmic couple exchanging material on Valentine's Day, You couldn't make

8:24 Speaker 1: it up.

8:24 Speaker 2: The study has been accepted for publication in the journal

8:27 Speaker 2: Astronomy and Astrophysics, and the preprint is already available on archive.

8:32 Speaker 2: A truly heartfelt discovery.

8:35 Speaker 1: Literally from hearts to headspinners. Scientists have been lift puzzled

8:40 Speaker 1: by a comment that has done something truly extraordinary. It's

8:43 Speaker 1: flipped its rotation direction.

8:46 Speaker 2: Palmet forty one p Tutal Jacobini Cresak try saying that

8:51 Speaker 2: three times fast was observed by NASAs Swift spacecrafts back

8:54 Speaker 2: in twenty seventeen, slowing its rotation dramatically. It went from

9:00 Speaker 2: once every twenty hours to once every fifty three hours

9:04 Speaker 2: in just sixty days.

9:06 Speaker 1: To put that in context, the previous record for a

9:08 Speaker 1: commentary spin down was held by Comet Hartly II, which

9:12 Speaker 1: slowed from seventeen to nineteen hours over ninety days. So

9:17 Speaker 1: Comet forty one p changed its spin rate ten times

9:20 Speaker 1: more dramatically in two thirds the time. It's unprecedented.

9:25 Speaker 2: But that's not even the stranger part. New analysis of

9:28 Speaker 2: Hubble space telescope images by astronomer David Jewett at UCLA

9:33 Speaker 2: has revealed that after slowing down, the comet's rotation appeared

9:37 Speaker 2: to actually reverse it started spinning the other way.

9:41 Speaker 1: The culprit appears to be the comet's own outgassing. As

9:45 Speaker 1: comets approach the Sun, the heat up and release jets

9:48 Speaker 1: of gas. When that gas escapes unevenly from the surface,

9:52 Speaker 1: what scientists call anisotropic outgasing, it creates a torque on

9:56 Speaker 1: the nucleus, gradually changing and eventually reversing its spin.

10:01 Speaker 2: Jewett estimates that the nucleus is less than zero point

10:04 Speaker 2: seven kilometers in radius, making it particularly susceptible to these forces.

10:09 Speaker 2: And here's the sobering implication. The lifetime of the nucleus

10:13 Speaker 2: to rotational instability is just a few decades, which is

10:17 Speaker 2: incredibly short compared to the thousands of years it's been

10:20 Speaker 2: in its current orbit.

10:22 Speaker 1: So while the comet's orbit might be stable for millennia,

10:26 Speaker 1: its physical integrity is much more fragile. It raises the

10:29 Speaker 1: question of whether comets might not last as long as

10:32 Speaker 1: we previously thought, with their own internal forces eventually tearing

10:36 Speaker 1: them apart. The paper is available as a pre print

10:39 Speaker 1: on archive for anyone who wants to dig into the details.

10:43 Speaker 2: And finally, here's something for everyone to look forward to.

10:46 Speaker 2: Later this month, a rare six planet parade is building

10:49 Speaker 2: in the evening sky, and the best part, it's happening

10:52 Speaker 2: at a perfectly civilized hour.

10:55 Speaker 1: Throughout February, six planets are lining up across the sky

10:59 Speaker 1: in what astronomers call a planetary alignment. The parade features Mercury, Venus, Mars, Jupiter, Uranus,

11:07 Speaker 1: and Neptune, and the show peaks on February twenty eighth.

11:11 Speaker 2: Now, four of those Mercury, Venus, Mars, and Jupiter will

11:15 Speaker 2: be visible to the naked eye, Urinus and Neptune will

11:18 Speaker 2: require binoculars or a telescope. The best time to look

11:22 Speaker 2: is about thirty minutes after your local sunset low in

11:26 Speaker 2: the western sky. You'll want a clear, unobstructed horizon.

11:30 Speaker 1: Mercury might be the trickiest to spot because of its

11:33 Speaker 1: low position near the horizon, but Venus and Jupiter should

11:36 Speaker 1: be unmistakable. They're the brightest objects in the evening sky

11:39 Speaker 1: after the moon.

11:41 Speaker 2: Now, this isn't quite as rare as the seven planet

11:44 Speaker 2: alignment we saw in February last year, which included all

11:47 Speaker 2: the classical planets plus Uranus and Neptune. That one won't

11:51 Speaker 2: happen again until twenty forty. But groupings of six planets

11:55 Speaker 2: are still pretty special.

11:57 Speaker 1: As astronomer Greg Brown from the Royal Observatory Greenwich has

12:00 Speaker 1: pointed out. While groups of three or four planets appearing

12:04 Speaker 1: together are relatively common, the more planets involved, the more

12:08 Speaker 1: orbital geometry has to cooperate. So a six planet parade

12:12 Speaker 1: is definitely worth stepping outside for.

12:15 Speaker 2: Mark your calendars for February twenty eighth, and maybe start

12:18 Speaker 2: scoping out a good western facing spot with a low horizon.

12:22 Speaker 2: We'll remind you as a day gets.

12:23 Speaker 1: Closer before we go, one more little Valentine's Day treat.

12:28 Speaker 1: If you're in the Northern United States or southern Canada tonight,

12:31 Speaker 1: you might want to step outside after dark and look north.

12:35 Speaker 1: NOAA forecasters are predicting possible G one minor geomagnetic storming

12:40 Speaker 1: this weekend, driven by the combined effects of a coronal

12:43 Speaker 1: whole high speed solar windstream and a coronal mass ejection

12:48 Speaker 1: from earlier this week.

12:49 Speaker 2: So there's a chance, no guarantees, but a chance to

12:52 Speaker 2: see the Northern lights tonight and into Sunday. Dates like

12:56 Speaker 2: Michigan and Maine, and of course our friends in Canada

12:59 Speaker 2: and northern US Europe have the best odds. What could

13:02 Speaker 2: be more romantic than watching the Aurora dance across the

13:05 Speaker 2: sky on Valentine's Day?

13:07 Speaker 1: Imagine telling your date, I arranged the Northern Lights just

13:11 Speaker 1: for you.

13:12 Speaker 2: Smooth move, very smooth. Well that's off for today's show.

13:16 Speaker 2: Whether you're spending Valentine's Day stargazing, watching a spacecraft doc

13:20 Speaker 2: with the Space Station, or just enjoying the cosmic love

13:23 Speaker 2: story of Mira A and its heart shaped nebula, we

13:26 Speaker 2: hope the universe gives you something to smile about today.

13:29 Speaker 1: Don't forget to subscribe to Astronomy Daily wherever you get

13:32 Speaker 1: your podcasts, and you can find us online at Astronomy

13:35 Speaker 1: Daily dot io and on social media at astro Daily Pod.

13:40 Speaker 1: If you enjoyed today's episode, please leave us a rating

13:43 Speaker 1: and review. It really helps others find the show.

13:45 Speaker 2: Until next time, keep looking up and Happy Valentine's Day

13:49 Speaker 2: from all of us at Astronomy Daily, Queer Skies, Everyone,

13:52 Speaker 2: Sunday Starts Store is the Soul Store? Is the troll

14:15 Speaker 2: mhm