Roman Telescope Update, China's Shenlong Mystery Deepens, and Quantum Breakthroughs in Space

0:00 Anna: Welcome to Astronomy Daily. I'm

0:02 Anna.

0:03 Avery: And I'm avery. It's Wednesday, the

0:05 25th of June, 2026, and you are

0:08 tuned in for season five, episode

0:10 123.

0:12 Anna: We have a varied and secretive show today.

0:15 A, uh, beloved space telescope has finally

0:18 arrived at its launch site. A secretive

0:21 Chinese space plane is doing mysterious

0:23 things in orbit. And we have a, uh, genuinely

0:26 exciting quantum physics story from right up

0:29 on the International Space Station.

0:31 Avery: Plus an update on a story we rang.

0:34 SpaceX's brand new secret

0:36 Starfall capsule is still up there in orbit

0:39 and we are watching and waiting for that

0:41 Pacific splashdown. More on that shortly.

0:44 Anna: But first, let's get straight into the

0:46 headlines. A, uh, Further update

0:49 on NASA's Nancy Grace Roman Space

0:52 Telescope, the agency's next great

0:54 observatory. And it has arrived at Kennedy

0:57 Space center in Florida. And the countdown to

1:00 launch is well and truly on.

1:02 Avery: This is a big moment. Roman touched down at

1:05 Kennedy on 21 June, arriving via

1:08 NASA's Pegasus barge after completing its

1:10 full assembly and testing phase at Goddard

1:13 Space Flight center in Maryland. The

1:15 telescope was sealed inside a specialized

1:18 shipping container. NASA has nicknamed it,

1:20 uh, the Chariot, keeping with the Roman

1:22 theme, and made the journey by sea down the

1:24 Atlantic coast to Florida.

1:26 Anna: And now it's inside the Payload Hazardous

1:29 Servicing Facility at Kennedy, where

1:32 engineers will spend the next 70 days

1:35 preparing it for liftoff. That work includes

1:37 checking the solar panels, inspecting the

1:40 thermal blankets and crucially, loading the

1:43 telescope's propellant tanks with around

1:45 290 gallons of hydrazine

1:48 fuel.

1:48 Avery: Now that fuel load is worth highlighting.

1:50 NASA has sized it to support at least twice

1:53 the planned five year primary mission

1:55 lifetime, meaning Roman could in principle

1:58 operate well into the 1940s if the hardware

2:01 holds up.

2:01 Anna: The launch target is no earlier than Sunday

2:04 30 August on SpaceX Falcon

2:07 Heavy rocket from Launch Complex 39A,

2:10 the same pad used for the Apollo Saturn V

2:12 rockets. And this puts Roman eight full

2:15 months ahead of its previous schedule. The

2:17 team has really delivered.

2:19 Avery: Once it reaches its destination at the second

2:21 Sun, Earth Lagrange Point, the same

2:23 neighborhood as the James Webb Telescope,

2:25 Roman will survey the cosmos in infrared

2:28 light. Its 300 megapixel camera covers

2:31 a field of view 100 times wider than

2:33 Hubble's per single exposure. That means it

2:36 can map billions of Galax galaxies, hunt for

2:38 hundreds of thousands of new exoplanets, and

2:41 probe dark matter and dark energy at a scale

2:43 and speed no telescope has managed before.

2:47 Anna: Webb goes deep, Roman goes wide.

2:50 And together they will give us a picture of

2:52 the universe that Neither could achieve

2:54 alone. Keep your eye on the skies and

2:57 on Kennedy Space center as we head into

3:00 August.

3:01 Avery: Story two and, um, this one has a Southern

3:03 Hemisphere connection. China's mysterious

3:06 Shenlong reusable spaceplane, currently on

3:08 its fourth mission in orb orbit, appears to

3:11 have released an unknown object into space.

3:13 And the first radar system to spot it was

3:16 right here in our part of the world. The Kiwi

3:18 Space Radar in New Zealand, operated by

3:21 commercial space surveillance company

3:22 LeoLabs.

3:24 Anna: At 2:30am UM UTC on

3:26 22 June, LeoLabs detected

3:29 something in the vicinity of the Shenlong

3:31 spaceplane that didn't match anything in

3:34 their catalog. They followed it across their

3:37 global radar network and confirmed with

3:39 high confidence that it was released,

3:41 released directly from the Chinese space

3:43 plane.

3:44 Avery: Now, this isn't entirely unprecedented.

3:47 Shenlong has released objects on each of its

3:50 three previous missions, though what those

3:52 objects actually are, China has never

3:54 officially confirmed. On its first mission, a

3:57 deployed object appeared to transmit

3:59 broadcast signals. On its second, it seemed

4:01 to conduct close approach maneuvers near

4:03 other objects in orbit. Each time, China

4:06 state media gives the same vague line. The

4:09 program provides technical support for

4:11 peaceful use of space.

4:13 Anna: The Shenlong, its name means divine

4:15 Dragon. Launched on its fourth mission back

4:18 in February on a long March 2F rocket from

4:21 the Jiquan Satellite launch Center in the

4:23 Gobi Desert. Analysts believe it's

4:26 broadly similar in size and function to the

4:29 United States Space Force's own

4:31 X-37B spaceplane, which is also

4:34 currently in orbit on its eighth mission.

4:36 Avery: The key capability being demonstrated here,

4:39 whether for peaceful or strategic purposes,

4:42 is what's called rendezvous and proxim

4:45 operations. That's the ability to maneuver

4:48 close to other objects in space. It can be

4:51 used for satellite servicing and refueling,

4:53 but it can equally be used for inspection

4:56 or interference.

4:58 Anna: We'll continue to watch this one closely. The

5:01 radar network that first spotted this new

5:03 object is based in Aotearoa, New Zealand,

5:06 a reminder of just how important Southern

5:09 Hemisphere space infrastructure has become in

5:12 monitoring what's happening in low Earth

5:14 orbit above all of our heads.

5:16 Story three today, and we're heading up to

5:19 the International Space Station for a quantum

5:21 physics story that genuinely made us stop

5:24 and stare. NASA's Cold Atom

5:27 Lab, a fridge sized facility aboard the ISS,

5:30 has just received its fourth and final

5:33 hardware upgrade, and the results are

5:35 remarkable.

5:36 Avery: Let's set the scene. The Cold Atom Lab has

5:39 been operating in orbit since 2018.

5:42 Its job is to cool atoms down to

5:44 temperatures just above absolute zero.

5:47 We're Talking below, below minus

5:49 459 degrees Fahrenheit.

5:51 Colder than anything that occurs naturally in

5:54 space. And then study what happens to matter

5:57 at those extremes.

5:58 Anna: At those temperatures, atoms can merge into

6:01 something called a, uh, Bose Einstein

6:03 condensate. A fifth state of matter

6:06 beyond your solids, liquids, gases and

6:09 plasma. In this state, instead of

6:11 behaving like tiny billiard balls, atoms

6:14 behave like waves. And they can exist in two

6:17 places simultaneously. They can pass through

6:20 one another. The normal rules go out the

6:22 window.

6:23 Avery: Now. Here's why doing this in space matters.

6:26 On Earth, gravity pulls these quantum gas

6:29 clouds downward Almost immediately you get a

6:32 very short observation window. In the

6:34 microgravity of low Earth orbit, those

6:37 clouds can float and be observed for far

6:40 longer. And with the new SM M3X

6:42 science module installed by astronaut Jessica

6:45 Mair back in May and activated the this week,

6:48 the lab can now create Bose Einstein

6:51 condensates that are five times larger than

6:54 anything it has produced before.

6:56 Anna: That's a significant leap. Larger

6:58 condensates mean longer observation windows,

7:01 finer measurements and the ability to probe

7:04 questions at the very frontier of physics,

7:06 including the nature of dark matter and the

7:09 long unresolved tension between quantum

7:11 mechanics and general relativity.

7:14 Avery: And there's a policy angle here too. On

7:16 22 June, President Trump signed an

7:19 executive order directing NASA to submit a

7:22 five year plan within 120 days

7:25 for developing quantum sensing and networking

7:28 for civilian space applications. The

7:30 Coldatom lab sits right at the heart of that

7:33 ambition.

7:34 Anna: Scientists at AH JPL describe this as

7:36 quantum 2.0, the direct

7:39 manipulation of large quantum states in

7:41 space. It took a century for the first

7:44 quantum revolution, which gave us lasers,

7:47 MRI machines and mobile phones to fully

7:50 materialize. The second one is now being

7:53 written in orbit in a fridge the size of a

7:56 mini fridge.

7:57 Avery: Story four brings us an update on Boeing's

7:59 Starliner program. And while there's

8:01 commitment on the surface, the details are

8:04 sobering. During a public meeting of the

8:06 Aerospace Safety advisory panel on June

8:09 23, NASA confirmed it is still working

8:12 toward the Starliner 1 uncrewed cargo

8:14 mission, but acknowledged the launch timeline

8:17 remains under review and could be as far as a

8:20 year away.

8:21 Anna: Let's recap. Boeing's Starliner

8:24 spacecraft completed its first crewed test

8:27 flight back in June of 2024,

8:29 carrying NASA astronauts Butch Wilmore and

8:32 Suni Williams to the International Space

8:34 Station. What was meant to be a brief

8:37 week long mission became an eight month

8:40 stay because of persistent thruster failures

8:43 and helium leaks that NASA and Boeing

8:46 spent trying to understand.

8:48 Wilmore and Williams ultimately came home on

8:51 a SpaceX dragon.

8:53 Avery: A post mission investigation report released

8:55 in February of this year classified that

8:57 mission as a Type A mishap, NASA's

9:00 most severe failure category, normally

9:03 reserved for missions involving loss of

9:04 vehicle or life. It cited hardware

9:07 failures, qualification deficiencies and

9:10 leadership shortcomings. Uh, at both NASA and

9:12 Boeing, the

9:13 Anna: core technical problem centers on what

9:16 engineers call the doghouse, the

9:19 structures that house Starliner's reaction

9:21 control system. Thrusters. Heat generated

9:24 by thruster firings causes the nitrogen

9:27 tetroxide oxidizer to partially

9:29 vaporize before combustion, creating

9:32 gas bubbles and reducing thrust.

9:35 Closing out those issues is what stands

9:37 between now and the Starliner 1 flight

9:40 Avery: panel member Kent Rominger, himself a former

9:43 NASA astronaut, noted that 22 of the

9:46 28 implied anomalies from the crew. Flight

9:48 tests have now been resolved, but the

9:50 remaining six, including the overheating

9:53 thruster issue, still need to be closed

9:55 before flight can be approved.

9:56 Anna: In May, NASA confirmed Starliner 1

9:59 will fly uncrewed as a resupply mission

10:02 rather than a crew rotation, and the agency

10:05 remains committed to the program. But as the

10:08 panel made clear this week, there is no

10:11 launch date and their may not be one for some

10:13 time yet.

10:14 Avery: It's a long road back for a spacecraft that

10:17 was meant to be a cornerstone of NASA's

10:19 Commercial Crew Program alongside SpaceX's

10:21 Dragon. We'll keep you updated as this story

10:24 develops.

10:25 Anna: Story 5 is an update on yesterday's

10:28 big launch story. SpaceX's brand new

10:31 Starfall reentry capsule, which lifted off on

10:33 a Falcon mine from Cape Canaveral yesterday

10:36 morning, is still in low Earth orbit and

10:39 a Pacific Ocean splashdown is imminent.

10:42 Avery: Just to recap for listeners who missed

10:44 yesterday's episode, Starfall is a disk

10:46 shaped uncrewed Cargo Return capsule,

10:49 3.1 meters across and only 75

10:52 centimeters tall that SpaceX has been

10:54 developing in remarkable secrecy. We only

10:57 know as much as we do because the US Federal

10:59 Aviation Administration published an

11:01 environmental assessment back in May.

11:04 SpaceX itself has said very little.

11:07 Anna: What we know is the capsule confirmed

11:10 orbital deployment at approximately 10:01 in

11:13 the morning Eastern time yesterday. It's

11:15 capable of carrying up to 1,000 kilograms

11:18 of cargo. That's about 2,200 pounds,

11:22 making it roughly 30 times the cargo return

11:24 capacity of current commercial rivals.

11:27 Avery: SpaceX has not announced a re entry date,

11:29 which is very on brand for this mission,

11:31 given they cut off their own webcast about 10

11:33 minutes after launch. But the FAA

11:36 environmental approval covers two re entry

11:38 demonstrations, both targeting a recovery

11:40 zone in the Pacific Ocean about 1300

11:43 kilometers off the US West coast, with a

11:45 recovery team standing by to retrieve the

11:47 capsule by boat after splashdown.

11:49 Anna: The bigger picture here is the market

11:51 Starfall is targeting in space.

11:54 Manufacturing. Growing pharmaceuticals,

11:57 fiber optics, and exotic alloys in

11:59 microgravity has been a, uh, theoretical

12:02 commercial opportunity for decades. The

12:04 barrier has always been getting finished

12:07 products back to Earth affordably.

12:09 Starfall, backed by Falcon 9's reusability

12:12 economics, could be the vehicle that finally

12:15 cracks that open.

12:17 Avery: It's also worth noting that SpaceX

12:19 simultaneously launched a $20 billion public

12:22 bond offering on the same day as a Starfall

12:24 demo. The company is clearly signaling that

12:27 low Earth orbit manufacturing logistics is

12:29 not a side project. It is a serious

12:32 commercial business line.

12:33 Anna: We'll bring you the splashdown news as, uh,

12:36 soon as it comes in. Fingers crossed for a

12:38 clean recovery.

12:39 Avery: And for our final story today, we're

12:42 traveling back in time, about 13 billion

12:44 years, to be precise, to visit a galaxy

12:47 that's in the process of building itself.

12:50 Anna: Astronomers led from Leiden University in the

12:52 Netherlands have discovered a vast reservoir

12:55 of cold molecular gas in a galaxy

12:58 called Rebels 25. And this

13:01 gas is the direct raw material for star

13:03 formation. We're seeing it as it appeared

13:06 when the universe was only about 700 million

13:09 years old. That's roughly 5% of the

13:12 universe's current age.

13:14 Avery: Now, to understand why this matters, here's a

13:16 quick primer. Stars don't just appear from

13:19 nothing. They form when enormous clouds of

13:22 cold molecular gas, primarily hydrogen,

13:25 become dense enough to collapse under their

13:27 own gravity. The more cold gas a galaxy

13:30 has, the more fuel it has to make new

13:32 stars. Finding it is finding the engine.

13:36 Anna: What makes the Rebels 25 discovery

13:38 particularly exciting is its scale and its

13:41 timing. The the researchers found not just a

13:44 little cold gas, but a genuinely

13:47 massive reservoir, far more than would have

13:49 been expected in such a young galaxy. This

13:52 tells us that even in the infant universe,

13:54 some galaxies were accumulating the raw

13:57 ingredients for star formation on a grand

13:59 scale.

14:00 Avery: The team used what's called redshift

14:03 measurements to find and study Rebels 25,

14:06 essentially measuring how much the universe's

14:08 expansion has stretched the light from the

14:11 galaxy to redder wavelengths over its long

14:13 journey to us. Higher redshift means further

14:16 away, and further away means further back in

14:19 time.

14:20 Anna: It's one of those stories that puts the scale

14:23 of things into perspective. The light we're

14:25 studying from Rebels 25 left that

14:28 galaxy about 13 billion years ago.

14:31 The stars that formed from that cold gas

14:33 reservoir, if any of them still exist, would

14:36 be among the oldest in the universe. And

14:39 somewhere in that distant galaxy, right

14:42 now, in its own reference frame, a, ah, star

14:44 formation event is either happening or

14:47 already long done.

14:49 Avery: Cosmology never gets old.

14:51 And on that beautifully mind bending note,

14:54 it's time to wrap up today's show.

14:56 Anna: That's Astronomy Daily for Wednesday, 25

14:59 June 2026. We're season five,

15:02 episode 123 and we are so glad

15:05 you're here.

15:05 Avery: You'll find today's show notes, source links,

15:08 and our blog post over at astronomydaily

15:11 IO. You can also follow us on social media.

15:13 We're astrodaily, pod across x,

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15:19 Anna: If you're enjoying the show, please take a

15:21 moment to leave us a review. Wherever you

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15:26 us. And we read every single one.

15:29 Avery: Until tomorrow. Keep looking up.

15:31 Anna: Clear skies everyone.

15:35 Mhm.

15:38 The.

15:43 Story.