S02E39: Moon Rocks, Japan's Space Quest, and Debunking Contrail Myths

[00:00:00] Welcome to Astronomy Daily for another episode. It's the 28th of August 2023, and we'll get right into it with another good batch of stories including Where Are The Moon Rocks? What Are Contrails? And we ask who is sending a toy to the moon? Stay tuned!

[00:00:28] Righto, righto, Hallie. What's all this silliness about sending a toy to the moon? Oh, okay. Keeping me in suspense. So what else is on the menu then? Japan is retiring one of its workhorse rockets, but it's still got a few missions to go.

[00:00:43] And you did some homework for someone. Yes, I found a little story about man-made clouds just to clear the air. Sounds cute. And what else have you got in store for us?

[00:00:53] Well, I must have rocks in my head. It's all about asteroids and rocks for me today. Well, mostly. Mostly. Well, that's interesting. Does NASA know about all the asteroids? Well, Hallie, the quick answer is no. The good news though is that we know where most of the really

[00:01:11] big asteroids are that get closest to Earth, and NASA has found more than 90% of those big asteroids. However, there are a lot of small pieces still out there that we haven't found, and that's where the planetary defense experts come in. This is all according to NASA

[00:01:26] asteroid expert Dr. Amy Mainzer. It's really challenging to find asteroids in comets because even though some of them are as big as mountains, space, as author Douglas Adams so eloquently put it,

[00:01:38] is really big, and these rocks can be really far away. In fact, we actually do want to find them when they're really far away from the Earth so that if necessary, we have lots of time

[00:01:48] to take action if we ever find one that's really actually headed in our direction. I don't want to think about that. It's probably not really worth worrying about. Asteroids are more of a source of fascination because they relics from the birth of our solar

[00:02:02] system, and it's incredibly unlikely that a significant asteroid impact would ever occur in our lifetimes. Regardless, our planetary defense experts monitor the skies to look for near Earth asteroids and comets, and we do hear about that in the news and make sure that the

[00:02:18] Earth and asteroids never get too close for comfort. Dr. Mainzer said, NASA knows what it has to do to find the remaining unknown asteroids and is on the job as part of an ongoing mission of planetary defense. How about that?

[00:02:30] I feel safer already. Oh, I'm sure you do, Hallie. Now how about some short takes? No problem. Here we go. The Mitsubishi Heavy Industries HIA launch vehicle, as its career is being wound down in favor of the H3, is preparing to fly the Smart Lander

[00:02:51] for investigating moon, slim, robotic lunar lander and the X-ray imaging and spectroscopy mission X-ray telescope on its 47th flight. After this flight, the second of 2023 for the HIA, the HIA will have three flights left before retirement. The H2 family has been Japan's

[00:03:11] workhorse launch vehicle for nearly 30 years. The HIA vehicle F-47 was scheduled to launch from the LA-01 launch pad at Tanigashima Space Center, Japan, on Monday, August 28th, at 026 Universal Time Coordinated. However, it was scrubbed due to weather. The launch window for this mission lasts until September 15th.

[00:03:35] The ZRISM X-ray Observatory is to be placed into a 550 km circular low-Earth orbit inclined 31 degrees to the equator. The slim lunar lander will also be placed in the same orbit but will use its own engines to get to the moon. This flight's main payload is the ZRISM,

[00:03:53] the Observatory is a replacement mission started in 2016 after the failure of the Hitomi X-ray Observatory weeks after reaching orbit. X-ray astronomy has only been performed within the last 60 years as X-rays from deep space are attenuated by the Earth's atmosphere.

[00:04:11] Hitomi's failure could have left the scientific community without an orbiting X-ray Observatory for a long period of time from the early 2020s to the late 2030s. JAXA began the ZRISM project in June 2016, three months after Hitomi's failure.

[00:04:28] NASA, ESA and major universities on three continents are collaborating on the project. X-rays are generated by objects like exploding stars, black holes, radio galaxies, pulsars and other high-energy phenomena. ZRISM's science objectives are to study clusters of galaxies,

[00:04:47] how the structure of the universe evolves, how matter spreads through interstellar space, how energy is transported through the universe and how matter behaves under strong gravitational and magnetic fields that cannot be created on Earth. To accomplish these objectives,

[00:05:02] ZRISM is equipped with two instruments, both attached to a dedicated X-ray mirror assembly. The Resolve Spectrometer is designed to make highly detailed measurements of an X-ray emitting objects' temperature and composition, and can make detailed Doppler measurements to determine

[00:05:18] how objects in the universe move. The Stend X-ray imager, like Resolve, is designed to observe soft X-rays. Stend has a field of view that can capture the full moon and can image larger celestial objects. On the heels of the successful Chandraeana 3 landing, Japan will seek to join

[00:05:37] the United States, the Soviet Union, China and India in the Club of Nations that have landed probes successfully on the moon. The Slim lander will attempt to succeed where earlier Japanese landing attempts with the Hakutoar and Omotonashi missions failed. A small probe known as the

[00:05:55] Lunar Exploration Vehicle 1 is to separate from Slim just before landing and image the site. Slim is also carrying the ball-shaped SoraQ Minirover, also known as Lunar Exploration Vehicle 2 that was designed by Tomi, the Japanese

[00:06:09] toy maker who invented the Transformers toys. Oh it's made by the same people that make the Transformers. Obviously more than meets the eye. Quite so. Where are the Moon Rocks? Where are the Moon Rocks from the Apollo missions kept? When they're not being studied

[00:06:28] by institutions or enjoyed by museum goers, NASA has a specialized Lunar Sample Curation Laboratory at NASA's Johnson Space Center to store and keep these otherworldly samples safe. Studying these samples helps us learn more about the origin of not only our moon but our planet.

[00:06:45] Former Deputy Apollo Sample Curator Dr. Julian Gross explains more about Lunar Sample curation. The rocks are stored in the Lunar Curation Facility. She is very excited that the Artemis mission is going to bring back new lunar samples to examine. This time from

[00:07:02] the South Polar Region. The Lunar Curation Facility is a clean room facility which means that the air gets filtered and personnel have to wear special protective suits. The rocks are store in cabinets

[00:07:15] filled with nitrogen to keep them safe from water and the Earth's atmosphere and germs which may affect them. Studying the Moon Rocks will help explorers to know what kinds of tools are needed in order to be more effective in future missions. And that's it from me today.

[00:07:32] Back to you Steve. Oh thank you very much Hallie for those stories that first one was quite a monster story actually it was a really big one from the Japanese space agency JAXA they're doing some

[00:07:51] mighty stuff and they are retiring that that workhorse rocket of theirs but not until it's done a couple more missions for them and those important things that are going up very shortly the slim and the unpronounceable mission which I have to look up now you'll have

[00:08:10] to forgive me because I've got to go back through my notes. Yes it's pronounced Zirizm which is X-R-I-S-M Zirizm. I think Hallie had a bit of trouble pronouncing that one as much

[00:08:23] as I did so you know as an Australian I have a lot of trouble with some of the pronunciations but I'm glad to see Hallie struggled as much as I did sorry Hallie but that's the way it goes

[00:08:34] you might be learning or I might be rubbing off on you you never know but anyway and Hallie did I tell you that I actually saw some moon rocks once? No you didn't Steve is this a joke or a real

[00:08:46] story? Oh no I promise you Hallie this is an absolutely true story I was on holidays with my parents in our nation's capital which is Canberra a lot of folks in the northern hemisphere

[00:08:59] tend to think that it's Sydney or Melbourne it's actually Canberra we're in Canberra and we were visiting the snowy mountains which was just a little way out of Canberra we were going to do

[00:09:09] some skiing and tobogganing and so on we're into the snowy mountains and my parents took us to see the moon rock exhibition which was visiting in Canberra at that time it was freezing

[00:09:21] and I remember seeing this rock under a dome of glass it was only about as big as a football the dome of glass was as big as a football the rock itself was only as big as a golf ball

[00:09:33] and it was mounted like a large gem rotating slowly in a small clamp and I knew it was special at the time but it was a rock and I can just recall the strangest feeling and it was it had

[00:09:46] greenish colors in it and it was a rock it does seem strange to treat a rock so reverently yes at the time I thought it was amazing I can't remember how old I was I was only young I might

[00:09:57] have been around 10 or 11 but I did think it was amazing this thing from another world that's a good way of putting it yes I guess it's all about the perspective a moon rock and you saw it with your own eyes and I guess it's important because seeing it

[00:10:12] got me interested in astronomy and space and science rockets astronauts and it opened up my imagination to those you know possibilities that is important we're listening to astronomy daily thanks for sticking with us and here's a quick reminder to register at

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[00:11:08] all the news that's new in astronomy from around the world. Now great news news of the world is the space X crew 7 dragon capsule has docked successfully at the space station into ISS and with a four

[00:11:23] person replacement team crew 7 is replacing crew 6 and the crew dragon capsule endurance docked at the international space station at 916 AMEDT where it parked itself at a space facing port on the outposts US build harmony module after flying a wide loop around the orbital outpost now

[00:11:46] that would have been fantastic to get a great view of the station dragon and the station were soaring 261 miles above Australia at the time hey welcome to my neighborhood guys thank you so much crew 7 commander jasmine mobelli of nasa radioed space X mission control after successfully

[00:12:04] docking I have to keep reminding myself that this is not a dream I'm telling you if you were anywhere near Australia is you're living the dream you're living the dream and in a quick answer

[00:12:17] to a conversation I had on facebook recently let's have a look at contrails contrails are created by jet engines cruising at altitude is it a cause for worry well not in the way

[00:12:27] that people might think if you live under a popular plane route then you're probably a no stranger to long thin clouds in the sky these are contrails emitted by aeroplanes contrails or condensation trails are essentially human made clouds they are trails of condensed water vapor created

[00:12:46] by jet engines according to the national weather service now who's going to argue with them we most commonly see them behind planes cruising at altitude but they can also be emitted by rockets contrails are created when the hot water vapor emitted by a jet engine after

[00:13:03] combustion cools and condensers in the earth's atmosphere according to the environmental protection agency the epa the atmosphere's temperature and humidity must be in just the right place for condensation to occur the air must be cold with a little bit of humidity contrails most

[00:13:19] commonly form at the airplane's cruising altitude between about 32 000 feet and 42 000 feet in the upper troposphere per the rocky mountains institute rmi because that's where these content conditions are found because the atmosphere is ever changing conditions might not be right for

[00:13:36] contrail formation at this altitude which is why not all aeroplanes create contrails during every flight generally speaking contrails are neither good nor bad they simply are cloud created by jet engines under certain atmospheric conditions that said research suggests

[00:13:55] that contrails contribute to atmospheric warming and cooling according to rmi and the warming in particular is a problem for the planet contrails that form at night or last into the nighttime are the main contributors for atmospheric warming according to rmi earth undergoes radiative

[00:14:11] radiative cooling at night heat radiates from the surface into space but clouds like contrails can in fact trap that heat contrail is a joining of two words condensation and trail all jet engines can potentially produce contrails but specific atmospheric conditions are required for that to

[00:14:29] happen and no contrails are not directly dangerous to humans there is a conspiracy theory that governments use aircraft to disperse toxic chemicals into the atmosphere for a variety of nefarious reasons creating chemical trails or chem trails that look similar to contrails however

[00:14:50] there is no evidence to support this scenario there is no basis to the conspiracy and scientists do not consider this at all credible steven barrett the h. n slater professor of aeronautics and astronautics at massachusetts institute of technology mit and director of the mit laboratory for

[00:15:09] aviation environment told space dot com for more definitive information about the factual side of contrails you can read david keith's information on the subject now keith is a professor of applied physics at harvard school of engineering and applied sciences and a professor

[00:15:28] of public policy at harvard kennedy school and he provides a detail debunking of the theory on his research groups website keith started climate science and technology as well as public policy of solar geoengineering i hope that cleared the air and just like that we've come to the

[00:15:50] close of yet another episode thanks for staying with us i hope you'll join us next time on astronomy daily fridays with tim gibbs monday's with yours truly steve dunkley and as always a reminder that you can find all the back episodes of astronomy daily and our parent

[00:16:04] podcast with adrew dunkley and professor fred watson at bites.com that's b-i-t-e-s-z or z dot com and also space nuts dot com and one more thing don't forget that astronomy daily newsletter

[00:16:18] which is a roundup of all of the top stories in astronomy every day register at the same address space starts and bites.com and as they say see you in the funny pages i'm your host steve dunkley catch you next time on astronomy daily bye