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00:00:00 --> 00:00:02 Anna: Happy Saturday space fans. I'm
00:00:02 --> 00:00:03 Anna.
00:00:03 --> 00:00:06 Avery: And I'm Avery. Welcome to Astronomy Daily's
00:00:06 --> 00:00:08 weekend space and astronomy news wrap.
00:00:09 --> 00:00:11 Anna: It's been another big week out there.
00:00:11 --> 00:00:14 Ancient quasars, mystery spheres on an
00:00:14 --> 00:00:17 Australian beach, and a solar system mystery
00:00:17 --> 00:00:20 hiding in plain sight on two very different
00:00:20 --> 00:00:20 worlds.
00:00:21 --> 00:00:23 Avery: And today we've also got two brand new
00:00:23 --> 00:00:26 stories, including a genuine world first from
00:00:26 --> 00:00:28 China and a tribute to one of the true
00:00:28 --> 00:00:30 pioneers of space flight.
00:00:30 --> 00:00:32 Anna: So settle in, let's get into it.
00:00:33 --> 00:00:35 Avery: Let's start with today's headline story.
00:00:35 --> 00:00:38 Yesterday morning, Friday, July 10,
00:00:38 --> 00:00:40 China made genuine space flight history.
00:00:41 --> 00:00:44 Anna: The Long March 10B rocket lifted off from
00:00:44 --> 00:00:47 the Hainan Commercial space launch site its
00:00:47 --> 00:00:50 very first flight and successfully placed a
00:00:50 --> 00:00:51 satellite into orbit.
00:00:52 --> 00:00:54 Avery: Nothing unusual about that bit. But about
00:00:54 --> 00:00:57 six minutes after the first and second stages
00:00:57 --> 00:01:00 separated, that first stage came back
00:01:00 --> 00:01:02 down out of the sky and FL itself
00:01:02 --> 00:01:05 directly into a giant net sitting on a
00:01:05 --> 00:01:06 ship at sea.
00:01:06 --> 00:01:09 Anna: A, uh, net, not legs. Like SpaceX's
00:01:09 --> 00:01:12 Falcon 9 or Blue Origin's New Glenn, the
00:01:12 --> 00:01:15 Long March 10B has no landing legs at
00:01:15 --> 00:01:17 all. Instead it deploys four
00:01:17 --> 00:01:20 lightweight hooks that snag onto a
00:01:20 --> 00:01:23 huge cross shaped cable tensioned net
00:01:23 --> 00:01:26 mounted on a purpose built recovery
00:01:26 --> 00:01:29 vessel called the Linghong Zhe, or
00:01:29 --> 00:01:30 Navigator.
00:01:30 --> 00:01:32 Avery: And here's the bit that makes engineers sit
00:01:32 --> 00:01:35 up. This was the rocket's maiden flight.
00:01:35 --> 00:01:38 No one has ever nailed a first stage booster
00:01:38 --> 00:01:40 recovery on the very first attempt before.
00:01:41 --> 00:01:43 Not SpaceX, not Blue Origin.
00:01:43 --> 00:01:46 Anna: China's other reusable contenders, The Long
00:01:46 --> 00:01:49 March 12A and the Commercial Zhuque 3,
00:01:49 --> 00:01:52 both reached orbit on their debut flights
00:01:52 --> 00:01:54 last December. But neither one stuck the
00:01:54 --> 00:01:57 landing. This is the one that finally worked.
00:01:57 --> 00:01:58 First try.
00:01:59 --> 00:02:01 Avery: The recovery ship itself is no small thing
00:02:01 --> 00:02:04 either. 144 meters long, 50
00:02:04 --> 00:02:07 meters wide, over 25
00:02:07 --> 00:02:10 tons, fully loaded. MHM uses LiDAR at
00:02:10 --> 00:02:12 each corner to track the falling booster's
00:02:12 --> 00:02:15 position and attitude in real time. And the
00:02:15 --> 00:02:17 net's cables absorb all that kinetic energy.
00:02:18 --> 00:02:20 So the rocket ends up just hanging there
00:02:20 --> 00:02:22 motionless, dead center.
00:02:22 --> 00:02:25 Anna: Casc, the state owned China
00:02:25 --> 00:02:27 Aerospace Science and Technology Corporation,
00:02:28 --> 00:02:31 says the net approach actually has real
00:02:31 --> 00:02:33 advantages over the SpaceX style vertical
00:02:33 --> 00:02:36 leg landing. It simplifies the booster's
00:02:36 --> 00:02:39 structure, cuts weight and is more forgiving
00:02:39 --> 00:02:42 of landing position errors because the net
00:02:42 --> 00:02:43 system can adjust to catch it.
00:02:44 --> 00:02:46 Avery: This makes China only the second nation on
00:02:46 --> 00:02:49 Earth to achieve controlled recovery of an
00:02:49 --> 00:02:51 orbital class rocket booster. And The Long
00:02:51 --> 00:02:54 March 10B becomes the sixth launch system
00:02:54 --> 00:02:57 in history to pull it off after the space
00:02:57 --> 00:02:59 Shuttle Falcon 9, Electron
00:02:59 --> 00:03:01 Starship and New Glenn.
00:03:01 --> 00:03:04 Anna: There's a bigger picture here, too. The Long
00:03:04 --> 00:03:07 March 10B is a commercial cousin of the
00:03:07 --> 00:03:10 Long March 10A and 10, the
00:03:10 --> 00:03:12 Rocket family being built to carry Chinese
00:03:12 --> 00:03:15 astronauts to the moon before 2030.
00:03:15 --> 00:03:18 So every piece of reusable technology proven
00:03:18 --> 00:03:21 here feeds directly into that crewed
00:03:21 --> 00:03:22 lunar program.
00:03:22 --> 00:03:25 Avery: CASC says they're aiming to actually reuse
00:03:25 --> 00:03:27 this very booster by the end of the year.
00:03:27 --> 00:03:30 Shares in Chinese aerospace firms jumped on
00:03:30 --> 00:03:32 the news with a couple of them hitting daily
00:03:32 --> 00:03:33 trading limits.
00:03:33 --> 00:03:36 Anna: A genuinely big moment for global
00:03:36 --> 00:03:38 spaceflight, and a reminder that the reusable
00:03:38 --> 00:03:41 rocket club, once a club of exactly
00:03:41 --> 00:03:44 one, just got a lot more interesting.
00:03:44 --> 00:03:47 Now into our weekly highlights, the biggest
00:03:47 --> 00:03:50 stories from the past five days, starting
00:03:50 --> 00:03:52 with one we told you about earlier this week.
00:03:52 --> 00:03:54 A genuinely staggering haul of ancient
00:03:54 --> 00:03:55 quasars
00:03:56 --> 00:03:58 Avery: ESA's Euclid Space Telescope has
00:03:58 --> 00:04:01 discovered 31 previously unknown
00:04:01 --> 00:04:03 quasars from the universe's first billion
00:04:03 --> 00:04:06 years, and two of them are the most ancient
00:04:06 --> 00:04:08 ever recorded. Full stop.
00:04:08 --> 00:04:11 Anna: A ah, quasar happens when huge amounts of gas
00:04:11 --> 00:04:13 and dust spiral into a
00:04:13 --> 00:04:16 supermassive black hole at a galaxy's center.
00:04:17 --> 00:04:19 The friction and gravity heat that material
00:04:19 --> 00:04:22 to millions of degrees, and the result can
00:04:22 --> 00:04:25 outshine its entire host galaxy by
00:04:25 --> 00:04:26 a factor of a thousand.
00:04:27 --> 00:04:30 Avery: These two record breakers, catchily named
00:04:30 --> 00:04:30 Euclid
00:04:30 --> 00:04:34 J17.29
00:04:34 --> 00:04:38 56410.18.1
00:04:38 --> 00:04:39 and Euclid
00:04:39 --> 00:04:42 J1253.0.8
00:04:43 --> 00:04:46 054.3.2.3
00:04:47 --> 00:04:49 were shining when the universe just
00:04:49 --> 00:04:52 670 million years old
00:04:52 --> 00:04:55 that's about 5% of its current age.
00:04:55 --> 00:04:57 Their light has been traveling towards us for
00:04:57 --> 00:05:00 roughly 13 billion years.
00:05:01 --> 00:05:03 Anna: The previous redshift record, set back in
00:05:03 --> 00:05:06 2021, was 7.64.
00:05:06 --> 00:05:09 These two come in at 7.77 and
00:05:09 --> 00:05:12 7.69, both beating it.
00:05:12 --> 00:05:15 Avery: But honestly, the record breakers aren't even
00:05:15 --> 00:05:18 the most important part of this story. Lead
00:05:18 --> 00:05:20 researcher Demeng Yang of Leiden University
00:05:21 --> 00:05:23 points out that finding the first 10 or so
00:05:23 --> 00:05:26 quasars this old took astronomers
00:05:26 --> 00:05:29 more than a decade of painstaking work.
00:05:29 --> 00:05:31 Euclid found more than that in about
00:05:31 --> 00:05:34 Anna: a year, which means for the first time,
00:05:34 --> 00:05:36 scientists have something like a real
00:05:36 --> 00:05:39 population to study a true census of the
00:05:39 --> 00:05:42 early universe's quasars, rather than just a
00:05:42 --> 00:05:44 handful of freakishly bright outliers that
00:05:44 --> 00:05:46 happen to be easy to spot.
00:05:46 --> 00:05:49 Avery: And that matters, because how these monster
00:05:49 --> 00:05:52 black holes got so big so fast
00:05:52 --> 00:05:55 so early in cosmic history remains one
00:05:55 --> 00:05:57 of the biggest open puzzles in astrophysics.
00:05:58 --> 00:06:00 Highlight number two takes us to home turf
00:06:00 --> 00:06:03 here in Australia, and it's a story that had
00:06:03 --> 00:06:05 a lot of listeners messaging us this week.
00:06:06 --> 00:06:08 Anna: Dick's Large, metallic spherical
00:06:08 --> 00:06:11 objects washed ashore at Forest beach north
00:06:11 --> 00:06:13 of Townsville in Queensland. And
00:06:13 --> 00:06:15 understandably, that triggered a HAZMAT
00:06:15 --> 00:06:17 response. While authorities worked out
00:06:17 --> 00:06:18 exactly what they
00:06:18 --> 00:06:21 Avery: were dealing with, speculation ran wild
00:06:21 --> 00:06:23 for a bit. Everything from weather balloons
00:06:23 --> 00:06:26 to something rather more exotic. But the
00:06:26 --> 00:06:29 answer turned out to be space related after
00:06:29 --> 00:06:31 all, just not alien. They were
00:06:31 --> 00:06:34 identified as pressure vessels, remnants of a
00:06:34 --> 00:06:36 rocket that had re entered the atmosphere and
00:06:36 --> 00:06:37 broken apart.
00:06:37 --> 00:06:40 Anna: These composite overwrapped pressure vessels,
00:06:40 --> 00:06:43 COPVs for the acronym lovers, are used
00:06:43 --> 00:06:46 to store gases like helium or nitrogen under
00:06:46 --> 00:06:48 high pressure aboard rockets. They're built
00:06:48 --> 00:06:50 tough, specifically so they can survive
00:06:50 --> 00:06:52 extreme pressure differentials, which
00:06:52 --> 00:06:55 unfortunately also means they're pretty good
00:06:55 --> 00:06:56 at surviving RE entry.
00:06:57 --> 00:06:59 Avery: It's not actually the first time debris like
00:06:59 --> 00:07:02 this has turned up in Australian shores, but
00:07:02 --> 00:07:05 six at once, all in one spot,
00:07:05 --> 00:07:07 definitely got people's attention up in North
00:07:07 --> 00:07:08 Queensland.
00:07:09 --> 00:07:11 Anna: Uh, a good reminder that as launch rates
00:07:11 --> 00:07:14 climb worldwide, this kind of re entry debris
00:07:14 --> 00:07:16 story is only going to become more common.
00:07:16 --> 00:07:19 And it's exactly the sort of local angle we
00:07:19 --> 00:07:20 love bringing you here on the show.
00:07:21 --> 00:07:23 Avery: ILI3 is one of our favorite kinds of
00:07:23 --> 00:07:26 story. A, uh, genuine unsolved scientific
00:07:26 --> 00:07:29 mystery. New analysis of James Webb
00:07:29 --> 00:07:31 Space Telescope data has turned up an
00:07:31 --> 00:07:34 unexplained absorption feature. A specific
00:07:34 --> 00:07:36 field fingerprint in the light at
00:07:36 --> 00:07:39 5.11 micrometers, showing up
00:07:39 --> 00:07:42 on the surfaces of both Titan, Saturn's
00:07:42 --> 00:07:45 big hazy moon, and Pluto, way out
00:07:45 --> 00:07:47 at the solar system's edge.
00:07:47 --> 00:07:49 Anna: Two worlds that could hardly be more
00:07:49 --> 00:07:52 different. Titan has a thick nitrogen methane
00:07:52 --> 00:07:54 atmosphere and lakes of liquid
00:07:54 --> 00:07:57 hydrocarbons. Pluto is airless, well,
00:07:57 --> 00:08:00 near enough bitterly cold and covered in
00:08:00 --> 00:08:03 nitrogen and methane isis. And yet this
00:08:03 --> 00:08:06 same unexplained signature shows up on both.
00:08:06 --> 00:08:09 Avery: Researchers have already ruled out the usual
00:08:09 --> 00:08:11 suspects. The known ices, the known
00:08:11 --> 00:08:14 hydrocarbons. Nothing quite
00:08:14 --> 00:08:14 matches.
00:08:15 --> 00:08:17 Anna: The leading candidate at the moment is a
00:08:17 --> 00:08:19 class of molecules called Allenes, but that's
00:08:19 --> 00:08:22 not confirmed, and scientists are the first
00:08:22 --> 00:08:23 to say so.
00:08:23 --> 00:08:26 Avery: What's exciting is what it might mean if it
00:08:26 --> 00:08:28 does turn out to be something new. Uh, a
00:08:28 --> 00:08:30 shared chemical process happening
00:08:30 --> 00:08:33 independently on two very different distant
00:08:33 --> 00:08:36 world could tell us something fundamental
00:08:36 --> 00:08:38 about the kind of chemistry that's possible
00:08:38 --> 00:08:40 out at the cold, dark edges of a solar
00:08:40 --> 00:08:41 system.
00:08:41 --> 00:08:43 Anna: We'll definitely be keeping an eye on this
00:08:43 --> 00:08:45 one as more analysis comes in.
00:08:45 --> 00:08:48 Avery: And our final highlight from the past week
00:08:48 --> 00:08:50 takes us out to the true edge of the solar
00:08:50 --> 00:08:53 system, where an old friend has just opened
00:08:53 --> 00:08:54 its eyes again.
00:08:54 --> 00:08:57 Anna: NASA's New Horizons spacecraft, the
00:08:57 --> 00:08:59 mission that gave us our first close up look
00:08:59 --> 00:09:02 at Pluto back in 2015 and then
00:09:02 --> 00:09:04 flew past the Kuiper Belt object arrokaph uh
00:09:05 --> 00:09:08 in 2019, has emerged from a
00:09:08 --> 00:09:10 321 day hibernation period.
00:09:11 --> 00:09:14 Avery: It's currently around 5.9 billion
00:09:14 --> 00:09:17 miles from Earth out in the Kuiper Belt, well
00:09:17 --> 00:09:20 beyond Pluto's orbit. Putting a spacecraft
00:09:20 --> 00:09:22 into hibernation between observation
00:09:22 --> 00:09:25 campaigns is standard practice for these
00:09:25 --> 00:09:27 ultra long durations. It
00:09:27 --> 00:09:30 conserves power, reduces wear on the systems
00:09:30 --> 00:09:33 and honestly gives the ground team a breather
00:09:33 --> 00:09:33 too.
00:09:34 --> 00:09:37 Anna: Now that it's awake, the team can resume New
00:09:37 --> 00:09:39 Horizons ongoing science campaign,
00:09:39 --> 00:09:42 including its unique measurements of the
00:09:42 --> 00:09:44 solar wind and the heliosphere from m a
00:09:44 --> 00:09:47 vantage point no other operating spacecraft
00:09:47 --> 00:09:48 can match.
00:09:48 --> 00:09:51 Avery: It's a lovely reminder that some of our most
00:09:51 --> 00:09:53 valuable space explorers are the ones that
00:09:53 --> 00:09:56 just keep going decade after
00:09:56 --> 00:09:59 decade, quietly rewriting what we know about
00:09:59 --> 00:10:00 the outer solar system.
00:10:01 --> 00:10:04 Anna: And to wrap things up today, we wanted to
00:10:04 --> 00:10:05 take a moment for something a little
00:10:05 --> 00:10:07 different. A tribute.
00:10:07 --> 00:10:10 Avery: Wally Funk, full name Mary Wallace
00:10:10 --> 00:10:13 Funk, passed away this week in her home in
00:10:13 --> 00:10:15 Grapevine, Texas at the age of 87.
00:10:16 --> 00:10:19 Anna: If that name doesn't immediately ring a bell,
00:10:19 --> 00:10:22 her story absolutely should. Back in
00:10:22 --> 00:10:24 1961, Funk volunteered for a
00:10:24 --> 00:10:27 privately run program that tested whether
00:10:27 --> 00:10:30 America's best female pilots could pass
00:10:30 --> 00:10:33 the same rigorous physical and mental tests
00:10:33 --> 00:10:36 NASA gave its male astronaut candidates.
00:10:36 --> 00:10:38 Avery: She was the youngest of the group that became
00:10:38 --> 00:10:41 known as the mercury 13. And by every
00:10:41 --> 00:10:44 account, she was extraordinary at it. She
00:10:44 --> 00:10:47 outperformed, uh, many of the men on the very
00:10:47 --> 00:10:47 same tests.
00:10:48 --> 00:10:51 Anna: But in 1961, NASA
00:10:51 --> 00:10:53 simply wasn't selecting women as astronauts.
00:10:54 --> 00:10:56 None of the mercury 13 ever flew for the
00:10:56 --> 00:10:59 agency. Funk applied to NASA four
00:10:59 --> 00:11:02 times over the following decades and was
00:11:02 --> 00:11:05 turned down every time, at one point being
00:11:05 --> 00:11:07 told she didn't have the right engineering
00:11:07 --> 00:11:09 degree. So she went out and started working
00:11:09 --> 00:11:10 toward one anyway.
00:11:11 --> 00:11:14 Avery: She never stopped flying. Over her lifetime,
00:11:14 --> 00:11:17 she logged more than 19
00:11:17 --> 00:11:19 flight hours, became the first female
00:11:19 --> 00:11:22 civilian flight instructor at a US military
00:11:22 --> 00:11:24 base, the first woman inspector for the
00:11:24 --> 00:11:27 FAA, and personally trained more than
00:11:27 --> 00:11:28 3 pilots.
00:11:29 --> 00:11:31 Anna: And then, 60 years after that first round
00:11:31 --> 00:11:34 of astronaut testing, she finally got her
00:11:34 --> 00:11:37 ride. In July 2021, Blue
00:11:37 --> 00:11:40 Origin founder Jeff Bezos invited her
00:11:40 --> 00:11:42 aboard as an honored guest on the New
00:11:42 --> 00:11:45 Shepard NS16 flight alongside
00:11:45 --> 00:11:47 himself and his brother Mark.
00:11:47 --> 00:11:50 Avery: At 82 years old, Wally
00:11:50 --> 00:11:52 Funk became the oldest woman ever
00:11:52 --> 00:11:55 to fly to space. A record she
00:11:55 --> 00:11:58 still holds 11 minutes, a
00:11:58 --> 00:12:01 few precious moments of weightlessness, and
00:12:02 --> 00:12:04 six decades of waiting finally
00:12:04 --> 00:12:05 answered.
00:12:05 --> 00:12:08 Anna: Blue Origin posted a tribute, calling her a
00:12:08 --> 00:12:11 pioneer in every sense of the word, and
00:12:11 --> 00:12:13 NASA's own administrator, Jared Isaacman
00:12:14 --> 00:12:16 wrote that her passion for flight and
00:12:16 --> 00:12:18 exploration will keep inspiring generations
00:12:19 --> 00:12:20 of Americans.
00:12:20 --> 00:12:23 Avery: A friend and caregiver in Grapevine described
00:12:23 --> 00:12:26 her as the most eternally optimistic person
00:12:26 --> 00:12:29 she'd ever met, someone who was told
00:12:29 --> 00:12:31 no more times than most of us could bear
00:12:31 --> 00:12:34 and simply never let it stick.
00:12:34 --> 00:12:37 Anna: Fly Wally Clear skies always
00:12:38 --> 00:12:38 now, just
00:12:38 --> 00:12:41 Avery: before we go, let's lighten the mood and send
00:12:41 --> 00:12:43 you outside this weekend because there's a
00:12:43 --> 00:12:45 lovely little sky show on offer.
00:12:45 --> 00:12:48 Anna: Before dawn today, July 11, early
00:12:48 --> 00:12:51 risers got treated to a beautiful lineup. Low
00:12:51 --> 00:12:53 in the east northeast, a, uh, slender
00:12:53 --> 00:12:56 crescent moon joining Mars, the bright orange
00:12:56 --> 00:12:59 star Aldebaran, and the Pleiades and Hyades
00:12:59 --> 00:13:02 star clusters all in the same patch of sky.
00:13:03 --> 00:13:05 Avery: If you missed it this morning, the wider
00:13:05 --> 00:13:07 grouping is still worth a look over the next
00:13:07 --> 00:13:10 few mornings. Get out about 90 minutes
00:13:10 --> 00:13:12 before sunrise, find a clear eastern
00:13:12 --> 00:13:15 horizon and bring binoculars if you've got
00:13:15 --> 00:13:17 them for a closer look at the Pleiades.
00:13:17 --> 00:13:20 Anna: Southern Hemisphere viewers. That's an easy
00:13:20 --> 00:13:22 one for us here at home. No special gear
00:13:22 --> 00:13:25 required, just a decent horizon and a bit of
00:13:25 --> 00:13:25 patience.
00:13:26 --> 00:13:28 Avery: A gentle, pretty way to close out the week.
00:13:29 --> 00:13:32 Anna: And that's this week's weekend space and
00:13:32 --> 00:13:35 astronomy news wrap A world first rocket
00:13:35 --> 00:13:37 recovery, a farewell to a true space
00:13:37 --> 00:13:40 pioneer, ancient quasars mystery M
00:13:41 --> 00:13:43 Spheres, an unsolved mystery on two
00:13:43 --> 00:13:46 worlds and an old spacecraft waking back
00:13:46 --> 00:13:47 up.
00:13:47 --> 00:13:49 Avery: If you enjoyed today's episode, please hit
00:13:49 --> 00:13:51 subscribe wherever you're listening and leave
00:13:51 --> 00:13:54 us a review. It genuinely helps new listeners
00:13:54 --> 00:13:54 find the show.
00:13:55 --> 00:13:56 Anna: I'm Anna.
00:13:56 --> 00:13:58 Avery: And I'm Avery. We'll see you next time on
00:13:58 --> 00:13:59 Astronomy Daily.