This episode of astronomy cast is brought to you bye swing burn astronomy online the world longest running online astronomy degree program this it astronomy dot s w i n dot eighty dot eighty for more information. One of my god episode one hundred seventy one or me can you ring don't nine person server was running faster backspace because most reopen understand. Only what we know what how we don't want you know my name is phrase okay number publishers university him with his doctor pamela t a professor southern illinois university. You know how you doing i'm doing well how are you doing phase are doing great no i understand you have neat tasks. You wish to ah to get some help with from listeners i do i have a homework assignment for all of you now when we look at our google stats it gives us a vague i. e. of where people coming to our site are coming from but. It doesn't give us personality it doesn't help us explain to other people who are audiences. So i'm gonna ask you did you something that i hope this simple go get a postcard of where you live. And just send it to us no matter where on the planet you are. We have a p o box uh you can reach us at astronomy cast at two bucks eight oh four edward sell illinois six two oh two five and we can close that address on her website so all i wouldn't suppose cart disturbance card. Simple postcard say hey hi having fun wish you were here. Especially crop less or and give us a face to who you are that would be cool. Last week to talk to work personals. Close the people oh william herschel his sister carolyn and his son john and this week we're gonna look at the herschel space observatory. Herschel the robot then launched in two thousand and nine to reveal the coldest in dos just regions in the universe. Right so what sort of a commercial delco bed so what is it. It's a telescope thank you for that what is it. It's it's an incredible there victorian it was launched may fourteen fifteen thousand nine that is the biggest andy most infrared observing of the and fred observatory shipping launched into space so far so we're gonna compare the two spencer then right. It it's actually something entirely now it has in there that's about four times bigger than why has been seen before and it goes further into the infra red and we've been able to go before rifles and infrared. Is the spectrum um or is is on the in on the uh you want to make their expect them. On the more read side do you want to read when we we've done will show on on infra red. Personal starts wearing ends where. It it goes okay so herschel machine goes roughly from about fifty five microns out to about six hundred and seventy microns. So this is way wage smaller wavelengths once you start getting down to the fifty my crying then anything that can get drafted fear. So what we run into when we started with infrared is our atmosphere in particular the water and in many cases at remove infrared light and it never read to the surface so we have to lunch telescope since space if we went to start studying. Things like molecular transmissions things like galaxy for me at the edge of the universe and and print also the sneak feature where it lets us look three best which is always a good thing right so this is eve region all of the electromagnetic spectrum. In the infra red but it's the part of the infra red the longer wavelengths. That are blocked by. The earth's atmosphere. Yeah and and if i can kind of remember from our from our preview show on on infra red. Dishes stuff sort of each surrounded by dust that that delighted to like with normal people walked but inference can see through that. We're seeing like total planetary systems into nebula into the heart of the milky way and then also scenes oh to the very distant edges of the universe right where where the life has been red shift. Exactly. And so we're essentially studying the birth of stars all throughout the history of the universe in a lot of ways. Because nearby analyze this look at start for me regions and look into the star forming return and see the stars or just getting going not not bright hot stars there there josh. You know they're warmer than the background exactly and were able to see that detailed a temperature flows in some way how is the material flowing through these enough to start for nation. But then as we look out to the. Beginning moments of the universe we're seeing star information that. And the stars who are you marriage from their gas and dusting giving off violent announces walter violate radiation but. By the time that old for violence has been stretched instructions stretching stretched on the jury from the first one to the university today itself back out into the infrared. Right so then herschel uh it's got the e detectors to see this this infra red easy it's four times it's gonna mere those four times larger than any other. Ah tole scope of using that it just looking and just spectrum. It has the three and a half meter maher. And it also is high resolution spectrometer so it's able to start thing uhhuh right there i see carbon monoxide right there i see water into were able to start tearing apart. Letter all of the different molecules found what are all they individual elements that were starting to turn out and all of these different gas class. And this is part of the situation where. Different mold jewels will release select from at or four times were you at a very specific wavelength right and then you can see them and then you know that that that those four times coming at me are evidence of. Alcohol no the hotmail hide or or uh you know exactly so you can see those individual molecules. There there's all sorts of in these things stuff out there and the key to being able to see all of it is to first get above the atmosphere and then get yourself a good and cold and keep yourself that way so. And this is one of the things that makes it getting herschel where it is i. Something i'm not a challenge but ah waiting process for scientists they had to take herschel and stick it out on the other side uh that that sign earth system so you go sign earth and then you go out past that oh two. And it out in the l- to grab occasional point where you're constantly living in here it's shadow that they decided to stick this little mission. Is there anything else out in l. too. Well it were working on slowly filling it up it's where james what is going to go live i believe it's were w map live right now. It's a good place to stick things you wanna keep cold. Because the or acts as a sh- some shade and it also is a constant temperature if you think about it something that's going and then out of it here's shadow all the time level surface temperature fluctuations. And and internet the sensitive to well the color of temperatures one way to think of it. Having all this temperature fluctuations is is going to make any sort of accuracy very difficult one of the problems with them for it tells goats if they can see themselves if they get warm. And if the to move your telescope gets hot it's going to be the brightest thing your field of view and that's just a really bad idea so they keep these telescope in the shade they keep these telescope swear they can be completely thoroughly controlled. Right not having to constantly go in and out of the sons light you've kind of amazing you think about it you know we already know that space incredibly cold you know just a few degrees above absolute zero. And then it cooled them further because that's not cold enough it's a. Well it's also a matter of they have to cool off the detectors because well electronics get warm anyone who sat on uh the the so but with their apple laptop in their lap at you might want to grab the pillow before you burned yourself. And electronics gets warm telescope to get warm and say you do have to use credit john to cool to locking do you have to launch them with the reserves of cooling liquids. And in some ways that a is uh i i cursed because it limits how long these missions can last. How about we can keep he's in hubbell as long as the little jars groups are happy to keep spending as long as the detectors are able to send us back data. Some of the instrument somehow pulled do get cool but not all of them but once you start looking at the university of. In the infra red well now you're limited by how much credit jennings you can carry up with you and so herschel we have planned to be able to use for three and a half years. And if we're lucky will be able to get it all the way out to four and a half years we think that the credit tax without well enough that they'll they'll be able to keep going and last a whole lot longer. Right if big craft that evaporate faster than that it's happened was one of of how close instruments able how to shorten commission and it's shorten the not assigned but it's able to do. Right right and this is this is the mobile situations like the spirit opportunities you keep going and going going so. Yeah they've got a very sad life spent this is more like phoenix lines where. No i have one winter and that's it so right even even when it runs out of the crown exit still uh a useful telescope it still gonna be able to see just not really cold stuff and. Well i unfortunately the way it's been calibrated it actually has that life it'll really like uh it's not like spencer that has a war mission plant that's what i thought okay okay so it switched it's done. Right so it's in the states are they they have a war mission for sits there and there's actually a really fabulous um video pied cast the i are relevant your relevance um video series has a great one on on pictures warm mission. But with herschel uhhuh it's it's one and it said three and a half hopefully four and a half years i predict they'll figure out something to do. Something who knows what. Uninsurable figure out something. They'll be balancing blazers off of it to talk to an an helps you were something i don't know. I i think this is one of those times where they may just figure out how to recalibrate the instruments but probably not but probably going to move the dollar sign to the next big cool mission that gets much and one of the things we haven't really mention right is this is not. From now so no this is a year earlier he and they say you know see yeah this this is a program that. I i z explorer dead on it yeah couple of the instrument were built by nasa n part but. I love all the press releases are from the card s because i'm the doctor to fan and who doesn't love torch way that the file. So that has absolutely nothing to do with the mission that i just getting giggle every time i read press releases where all the sign sister from card of first. And so you have other as strong you can't contingent you have the european space agency that launched it. I they launch it from french new guinea and the launch and inches are fabulous and their i d's giant birds that are flying all around in the video and it looks like it's being swamped by terry doctors if you use your imagination. Switched h i choose to oh yeah this one's on area on rocket and which uh launched with planks. Right this this was one of the great missions where we got to great satellites for the cost of one rockets. I mean talk to what point ok we'll talk and then it me belongs slow journey oh just to told to and we the gun days a few days yes we've done episode on on the link once once l too is. As you said you know on the opposite side of the earth this is the point where the gravity schmoke forces or perfectly balanced and it requires e minimum amount of fuel to keep it in that position but it's like not. It's fairly stable it's sort of like perjuring of you know a car at the top of amount. Home you know as long as you keep the carpet the top of the mountain then you know it's not going to go anywhere but if it gets a little one way or the other major big just when this was a rule down the mountain then it's it's off away and so. Win a spacecraft as in detail two point used to keep firing of drug stores and and into remain in that in a position right. Well and and more than that if not sitting exactly in the center of of l too it's it's actually a. It forgive me i'm going to miss pronounce that's. Uh let's law or that that is centered on the l- to look around sh- point. And so it or been in a row of the l's here point which is more like you can imagine yourself attached to a piece of string bouncing around the top of matter horn well it really big ropes bouncing around the top of the matter form go. Exactly what i. And and so it's out there it's orbiting. But it has to have control crestors anyways to be able they to it and maintain its mission hm amazes drivers goes to do it it's pointing but it still it it has to be able to get where it needs to go and stay there. And so it launch um me two thousand and on and. Yeah and sure you are um as a recording this in. In early two thousand and ten whom would have been found so far. Well the first thing they did of course was take pretty pictures because that's what you do what you have a brand new telescope if you take pretty pictures. And what's amazing is by looking at nearby being bright pretty stuff they're already doing amazing science. I think looked at it start for me region in the consolation equivalent and they were able to see through the dark off the cleo cake gas. And dust and make out list amazing so and then she'll structures around the new forming stars where they can see not that are significantly hotter and. I individual point for stars are just starting to collapse and he got. And looking at these images. You can start to see how things are fragment thing how materials are flowing in the texture of the same message it it's really quite amazing and and they it turned it outward looking at the very go cluster. And eh they have this really fabulous pair of images one stolen bruce closely from the sloan this'll sky survey and then i comparison image that was taken the infrared with with herschel. And what they're able to show very well is. As you look out at these giant elliptical galaxy state are so bright an optical light they go right go away almost entirely in the infra red they just don't have that much gas and cost where is that. Small spiral galaxy switching star formation pop how disease right sources is infrared light. So suddenly were able to say i hot you you have gas and dust and you you are dad usual star for him no more just by looking at things in a completely different colors like. Right this is where the stars of or these gals she's of already used up all the dust and dust and so they're they're just going to agent die and just turn red or reservoirs are still have a little bit of dust left over. Herschel let them see these looks stockpiles of dos. And also let's just see the dust that we might not have noticed otherwise. N galaxy clusters there's a lot a lot of galaxy i galaxy violence that takes place there's. All right what we call galaxy harassment around pressure stripping all of these horribly violent words get used and what it boils down to through varieties there's different types of interactions between. Galaxy is and the galaxy send the stuff between galaxy so. New and that knocking gas and uh status it stops i. And in this herschel image i'll defer ago cluster you can see extended admission from a long dust trail streaming out behind another galaxy. And so you were able to see where the dust is this that removed from the off the cleveland and it's got like six. I mean and we'll linked to some of the pictures in the in the show notes but the beat the pictures coming out of of herschel or just are just beautiful there they're sort of in that same class is the hubble all the really beautiful nebula you know eagle now do um. Tools creation some of the pictures or just i'm using theory snowball seek right the pool colors right. What the you know we ignore that part of your the fact that these are the real callers your team with within fran guys but these pictures great the the picture of the. Of the new doing the kill uh there's a picture of the southern cross of of net doing something crossed and i i'm one of them fifty one these role released in in december uh for some of the first song it's a can of marshal on there just they're just beautiful pictures. Well that's really best why that launched what well not really well but when people personal germs today i believe is is the i could which we should check into that though. But it but beyond just in a pretty pictures there's also the occasional you look at it and go that's that's a lot of dots wizard nicely color dots but that that's a lot of dots and. One of the things that herschel participating in is the great observatory origins deep survey goods. This is the project it's taking any of the that's observatory is ah around the plan is in around on the planet and appearing at this blind small area on this guy roughly the size of the man. That has nothing nearby in it there's no in milky way based stars there's no nearby large galaxy is this is. And otherwise completely empty area on this guy. And. At the time is this release they'd used herschel for about fourteen hours on this one section of this guy which is no where near as much observing is are going to do by the time they're dying but in just that. Small fourteen hour window they were able to make out what looks like eh looking at christmas lights in the snow storm is is the best way i know how to explain it it's just dots and dots and dots and dots and dots. Of all the shades between blue and red except for green because there's nothing green in this guy. I'm at least not that the human i perceive and. These dot. Our galaxy is all the way back to the first moments of the universe. In the process of forming stars and sitting there glowing involving three time. So we're now able to in a single image look back hopefully to the beginning we need to start sorting out whether they nearby read galaxy some letter the galaxy should appear red exes there it at that the limits of what were able to see. But this is the first time we've been able to start resolving this color of light in the background this guy. Are they able to see. Like right to the to the background radiation on not quite. This we still have to sort out so to be able to say i have definitively seeing back to the first moments of the universe. You need to look at something and these are just little fuzzy blocks on this guy but you need to look at a little fuzzy blot on this guy and find some way to figure out how far back in time it is how far away to some distance. And they have spectrometer sir we have other methods as well to get out that. D press releases are coming they're not here yet i'm sure over the next three and a half to four and a half years were going to be seeing. And herschel is confirmed galaxy at red shift large number uhhuh looking back further and further to talk right and so what we're doing at this point is we are just drive a year in into this mission and i think. What herschel i mean is there a model water really official loses come out yet just because. These things take time i mean the scientists have to. Schedule a time herschel takes a readings they take it back to work on the journal articles and then they start to they start to publish and we're in that that in between time. Well they're still crunching numbers and and waiting to publish so well and it it's still very much a baby mission eight eight launched may fourteenth and then i took it sixteen games to get to look around you point. And then once it was there they had to calibrated all of the instrument. So we're still in terms of when you were able to start doing science their science images only started coming out late june. So we're just six months and so the mission and they're already starting to to say this is what we can say uhhuh. No sounds great there's a lot of good things to come yeah absolutely. So we've got another two and a half years of of life and spacecraft. And the news is just getting rolling in this is the time that i would recommend that uses grabbed universe today losing all the news that comes up we'll think of all am on eggs this screen this is the one of the. I was really turning that we can kind of getting to the ground for giving people some perspective so that when they see news it comes out about herschel they can oh yeah right that's that interests you know. Telescope and you told me about two years left and. And and really put the news is our perspective and know what they're looking at and like i said the first pictures that have come out are on me they're beautiful there there's a ton of these you would frame up and put on your wall there just is beautiful. Colors of greedy asians of colors it's it's quite amazing so. And the thing many of us are waiting for on the side to side is all of the really ugly spectrum numbers and route. Isn't that i i don't want to put that in the the site but those are the things that are going to tell us what molecules aren't space. And that cool isn't just one must be what would you say is like the biggest question you think that could be answered. Herschel. Herschel has the potential to look at the atmosphere's as exit plan it and say i see the components that are created only three life. Has the potential it has the potential we need to find the right planet. It needs to be a planet the transit sit star. And if those conditions are met. Then we have the chance to be able to. Pull out molecules not pockets atmosphere and that would be very cool that would be music it there's a bunch of missions or your when you know on that. And hopefully you know when james web finally shows up really have a tools that that are supposed to find. Nice and and in general this is a chemistry mission khan k met pictures that this mission to chemistry yeah and m n book chemistry till you so much yet cool horrible things want someone to talk to you this week okay but thing this is gonna veronica we quit westminster me through because oh sure transcripts for every episode are available on our website check it out and it's running here dot com instead of any comments questions or p back tenfold astronomy test dot com area for you ma'am so short nonprofit educational resource quite a boyfriend advance our family day we're supported through the confirmation but what about you if you enjoy seven cats once you've hit on it help favorite band with transferred just what was the only way on the website although they have one time about them over u. s. taxpayers' you can support sure for free to write a review for recommended to your friends every little bit helps quick support the show on our website instructions subscribe to the show on your broadband software after i have dot com quite part yeah thought at the moment worth it or not you because brought about travis world sure was that it is programs astronomy test is pretty well going on universe the overall wouldn't generous support from universal today hm uhhuh uhhuh uhhuh uhhuh oh
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