This is Spacetime Series twenty six, Episode one hundred and nine, for broadcast
on the eleventh of September twenty twenty three. Coming up on Spacetime, Have
they finally found Planet X? Japan's Chrism space telescope launches into orbit and discovery
of our own local baryonic acoustic oscillation. All that and more coming up on
Spacetime Welcome to Spacetime with Stewart Garry. Astronomers in Japan have found possible evidence
of an earthlike planet orbiting in the Kaiper Belt. The findings are reported in
the Astronomical Journal and on the pre Press physics website archive dot org. Are
based on the discovery event usual orbits for several Carper Belt objects, and suggest
a large Earth size planet orbiting around five hundred astronomical units out from the Sun.
An astronomical unit is the average distance between the Sun and the Earth,
roughly one hundred and fifty million kilometers or eight point three light minutes. The
Kiper Belt is a ring of comets, icy worlds, and frozen debris circling
the Sun out beyond the orbit of Neptune, which orbits some thirty astronomical units
out from the Sun. The dwarf planets Pluto and Sharon are probably the best
known Carper Belt objects. The new statis authors Patrick's to Fear like Kakwa from
Kindai University and Takashi Eater from the National Astronomical Observatory of Japan, describe the
orbital properties of trans Neptunian objects, which appear to be consistent with gravitational perturbations
that would have been caused by a planet not much bigger than the Earth orbiting
Among them, They also found a significant number of Carper built objects at inclination
orbits. Intrigued by their findings, follow up computer simulations designed to explain their
observations showed that the most likely explanation was a relatively large carbo built object,
such as a planet. The simulations also showed that such a planet, if
it exists, would have a mass of between one and a half and three
times that of the Earth, an inclination of approximately thirty degrees to the ecliptic
that is the plane where the planets roughly orbit the Sun, and an orbit
that would take the planet between two hundred and fifty and five hundred astronomical units
out from the Sun. The new findings are just the latest effort in an
ongoing search for a so called planet nine, sometimes referred to as planet X.
But what makes this new effort so interesting is that the suspected planets orbiting
much closer and than what previous studies have suggested. The first solid hints of
a possible planet X or planet nine came to light over a decade ago when
astronomers were looking for objects which could pose a threat to the New Horizon spacecraft,
which at that time was on a mission to study Pluto on the Kuiper
Belt. As they undertook their surveys, astronomers noticed some unusual gravitational perturbations in
the orbit of thirteen Kiper Belt objects, thought to have been caused by interactions
with a yet to be discovered massive planet sized body. Then, careful calculations
of the orbit of a Kuiper Belt object twenty twelve VP one thirteen by planet
hunters in twenty fourteen led to the detection of similarities in the orbits of several
other distant Kuiper Belt objects, and it resulted in the new hypothesis postulating the
possible existence of an unknown planet X or planet nine, now based on the
earlier observations, the undiscovered world would be up to four times the size of
the Earth and around nine times Earth's mass. Now that's a lot bigger what's
being proposed now. Also, the orbit was very different too. It was
on a highly elongated orbit around the Sun, estimated to last at least fifteen
thousand earth years. If it exists, the mysterious planet X could be an
interstellar rogue planet captured by the Sun's gravitational pool, or it could be a
planet that was stolen by the Sun's gravity from a neighboring star system early in
the history of the Solar System, when the Sun was just leaving it still
a nursery. Another option is that there are several models of planets in migration
within the Solar System, which suggests that as Jupiter and Satin migrated out to
their current orbital positions, their gravitational perturbations caused Neptune and Uranus to also move
outwards in the process, swapping their orbital positions and flinging a third ice giant,
which was part of the group, out into the Kiper Belt or possibly
even beyond into interstellar space as a rogue planet. Oh And as for the
indecision between planet X and Planet nine. Well, the first ideas of a
planet X in the Kiper Belt came at a time when Plutter was still considered
a fully fledged planet before it was demoted to dwarf planet status, and so
Skyper Belt World would have been a tenth planet a planet X. This is
space time still to come. Japan's CHRISM space telescope launches into orbit and discovery
of our own local barryonic acoustic oscillation all that them or still to come on
spacetime. A powerful new Japanese X ray telescope is just blasted into orbit.
The X ray Imaging in Spectroscopy mission CHRISM was launched aboard an H two a
rocket from the Tankashima Space Center in southern Japan's just a gossip. We have
a liftoff of the H Dwey launch peak or number of forty seven from jack
Start and the Gustimos based center at age forty two and level seconds am on
September stables depounced unt of time. The H Dewey is now flying about the
amount of an ocean duley least led by Jackson, the Japan Aerospace Exploration Agency
and collaboration with NASA and the European Space Agency, the two thousand, three
hundred kilograms spacecraft was placed into a five hundred and fifty kilometer high orbit.
Jackson had been forced to scrub three earlier launch attempts hit bad weather. The
new orbiting observatory will spend the next month checking systems and calibrating instruments before beginning
a three year scientific mission. Once operational, CHRISM will study some of the
hardest objects in the universe, such as neutron stars, black holes as they're
feeding, and massive galaxy clusters. CHRISMS Principal investigator Richard Kelly from NASA's Gottat
Space Flight Center in green Belt, Maryland, says the spacecraft will also examine
the aftermath of stellar explosions, and it will examine these speed of light particle
jets being launched from supermassive black holes at the centers of galaxies. CHRISM will
detect X rays with energies ranging from four hundred to twelve thousand electron vaults.
Now by comparison, the energy of visible light is around two to three electron
vaults. The electron vault range selected by scientists will provide astro physicists with new
information about some of the universe's hottest regions, some of its largest structures,
and objects with the strongest gravity. The mission has two principal instruments, Resolve
and EXTEND. Resolve as a microcalorometer spectrometer, developed in collaboration between NASA and
JACKSA. When an X ray photon hits resolves six by six pixel detector,
its energy will cause a slight increase in temperature. By measuring each individual X
rays energy, the instrument provides information about its source, such as its composition,
it's and its physical state. But to detect these tiny temperature changes,
Resolve needs to operate as just a fraction of degree above absolute zero minus two
hundred and seventy three point one five degrees celsius. To get that cold,
Resolves equipped with a multi stage mechanical cooling processor mounted inside a refrigerator size container
of liquid helium. Chrism's second instrument, Extend, is an image that developed
by Jackson to give the spacecraft one of the largest fields of view of any
X ray imaging satellite ever flown. It will be able to observe an area
about sixty percent larger than the average apparent size of the Moon, and the
images that collects will complement the data being collected by Resolve. Each instrument is
mounted at the focus of its own X ray mirror assembly, designed and developed
by Godard. See The thing is, X ray wavelengths are so short they
pass straight between the atoms of dis shape mirrors used to capture visible, infrared,
and ultraviolet light become these issues. X ray astronomers use nested, curved
mirrors turn on their sides. When X ray photons hit these mirrors, they'll
skip off the surfaces and into the detectors, just like a stone skipping across
the surface of a pond. Each of chrism's two mirrors houses hundreds of concentric,
precisely shaped aluminum shells, builting quadrants and assembled into a circle. In
all, there are over thirty two hundred individual mirror segments in the two mirror
assemblies. Also aboard the h to A rocket for the launch was Jackson's Smart
Lander for Investigating the Moon, or SLIM Spacecraft. SLIM is designed to demonstrate
new accurate pinpoint lunar landing techniques. NASA provided the laser retroreflector array used by
SLIM as. Both agencies cooperate in international effort to further explore the Moon and
ultimately human exploration of Mars. This report from NASS TV SO X rays really
shows us that's the universe is very argentina. We find X rays in jets
erupting from the centers of active galaxies. We use them to measure the spin
of black holes or supernova explosions. It takes a powerful event to produce cosmic
X rays. Sometimes people also called the hot universe because you know when you
have this gas in galaxy clusters or also around galaxies that you can see only
in X rays. This gas is about ten million to one hundred million of
degrees, which is so hot. That's this gas does not radiating in opticals,
does not radiating in fright, but it only radiate an X rays.
To further understand these hottest regions, we need the next generation X ray telescope.
The Japan Aerospace Exploration Agency or XA, is partnering with NASA and the
European Space Agency to launch the next generation X ray space telescope. The telescope,
called CHRISM, weighs over five thousand pounds, stands over thirty feet tall
and will orbit approximately three hundred and forty miles above Earth. We're familiar with
the medical uses of X rays. X ray light is energetic enough to pass
through our skin. Our calcium dense bones absorb that light, blocking it from
reaching the detector and creating a shadow. Luckily for US, X rays from
space don't make it through our atmosphere. But what that does mean is that
we have to send X ray hunting missions into orbit to detect this high energy
light. CHRISM also needs special kinds of mirrors, which are built at NASA's
Goddard Space Flight Center. The type of mirror is called a nested mirror.
It looks like like a cross section of the audience. X rays are so
energetic they fly right through typical mirrors. For the visible light, we typically
placed the mirror like for that light just bounce back, but for the X
rays this doesn't work, So that we put the mirror like so that X
rays just graze saurface of the shell. When they strike mirrors. At very
shallow angles, X rays two can bounce and then so we made it that
like a corny call shell. Then X ray can be directed. CHRISM has
two instruments, each with their own mirror assembly, one for imaging called Extend,
the other for spectroscopy called Resolve. Jack's a built Extend to provide chrism
with a wide field of view. It can observe an area about sixty percent
larger than the average apparent size of the full moon. NASA's Resolve instrument is
a spectrometer that splits X ray light like a prism so scientists can detect specific
elements present in the sources they're studying. It uses a small six by six
pixel detector called a micro calorimeter, nestled in a refrigerator sized container of liquid
helium. Resolve will measure the small temperature changes caused when X rays hit one
of those pixels. To track such small temperature changes, resolves detectors must be
kept extremely cold. That liquid helium cryocooler will keep the instrument at point zero
five degrees kelvin. It's so cold it is a fraction of a degree above
absolute zero. Heat is simply a product of moving atoms. Keeping resolves detector
that cold means that the atoms barely move, so there's very little thermal noise
in the system. It's what keeps these accurate measurements possible. Each X ray
detected will help scientists pursue many questions about the hottest regions of the cosmos.
What's happening in the extreme gravitational fields around black holes? Can we discover what
is inside a neutron star? How did some of the universe's largest structures,
like galaxy clusters evolve optical telescope you will just see in galaxies everywhere if you
if you look at this same cluster of galaxies and X rays, you will
see actually a lot of gas and the gas it constitutes actually most of the
matter the cluster of the galaxies, which is something extreme important to understand because
it means that most of the matter in the universe is not in the form
of planets or stars, but it's really in the form and of these gas.
So, but CHRISM really has this capability of decomposing this extraelites in a
way that's much much more accurate than what has ever been done before. And
in that report from Nassay TV, we heard from NASSA Chrism mission lestro physicist
Francis Maria at the Cashier Okajima this space time still to come discovery of the
local barry on a acoustic or oolation, and later in the Science report Australia
on course for increasingly hot and dry conditions. All that are more still the
calm on space time. Astronomers have discovered an immense bubble eight hundred twenty million
light years from Earth that's believed to be a fossil like remnant of the birth
of the universe. The bubble is thought to be the remains of a baryonic
acoustic oscillation, a pressure wave of fluctuation in the density of visible baryonic that
is, normal matter caused by acoustic density waves in the primordial plasma of the
early universe. In the same way that type one a supernova provide a standard
candle for astronomical distance. Baryonic acoustic oscillations are over dense cities of matter,
such as galaxies and galaxy clusters, and they're at set distances, just like
standard candles or standard rulers at this time on the scale of cosmology. The
length of this standard ruler is given by the maximum distance acoustic waves could travel
in the primordial plasma before the plasma cool to a point where it became neutral.
Atoms that's the time of the epoch of recombination, which stopped the expansion
of the plasma density waves, freezing them at a place. The length of
this standard ruler is about four hundred ninety million light years in today's universe,
and it can be measured by looking at the large scale structure of matter using
astronomical surveys. Current Big Bang theory tells us that during the first three hundred
eighty thousand years of existence since the universe came into being thirteen point eight billion
years ago, it was a cauldron of harkwark gluon plasma, and within this
plasma, electrons were separated from atomic nuclei. Now, during this period,
regions with slightly higher densities began to collapse under gravity, even as the intense
bath of radiation was still attempting to push matter apart. This struggle between gravity
and radiation made the plasma oscillate or ripple, and spread outwards. The very
largest ripples in the other universe depend on the distance a sound wave could travel,
set by the speed of sound and the plasma. This distance was the
four hundred ninety million light years we mentioned earlier, and it became fixed in
place once the universe cooled and stopped being a plasma, leaving vast three dimensional
ripples in its wake. Then, throughout the eons of the Universe's existence,
galaxies and galaxy clusters formed at the density peaks of these enormous bubble like structures.
The remnants of this plasma, now cooled down at just two point seven
degrees above absolute zero, can still be seen across the universe as the cosmic
microwave background radiation. You probably know it best as the faint white noise hiss
you get between stations on old analog radio and TV sets. The new structure,
reported in the Astrophysical Journal, has been named Holilana, a term drawn
from an Hawaiian creation chant involving the origins of structure. The studies lead author
Brent Tully from the University of Hawaii says he unexpectedly found the bubble while studying
a web of galaxies. He says his team weren't looking for it, but
it was so huge that it's spilled into the edges of the sector of the
scar that they were analyzing, and that piqued their interest as an enhancement in
the density of galaxies. Turns out this bubbles a much stronger feature than expected.
The very large diameter of a billion light years is beyond theoretical expectations.
If its formation and evolution are in accordance with theory, then this baryonic acoustic
oscillation is closer than anticipated. That implies a higher value for the expansion rate
of the universe. Astronomer's low the bubble using data from the Cosmic Flows For
experiment, which is to date the largest compilation of precise distances to galaxies.
Tally Co published a catalog last year, and this may be the first time
astronomers have identified an individual structure associated with a baryonic acoustic oscillation. The discovery
could help scientists bolster their knowledge on the effects of galaxy evolution. The same
team of researchers also identified the Lanier Kya galaxy supercluster back in twenty fourteen.
That structure, which includes their own Milky Way galaxy on its outskirts, is
small in comparison, stretching at a diameter of about five hundred million light years.
Laniar Key extends to the near edge of this much larger bubble. Tully's
team discovered that Ali Lana had already been noted in the twenty sixteen research paper
as the most prominent of several shell like structures seen in the Sloan Digital All
Sky survey. However, the earlier work did not reveal the extent of the
structure, and that team didn't conclude that they had found was the baryonic acoustic
oscillation. Using the Cosmic Flows full catalog, the authors were able to see
a full spherical shell of galaxies, identify its center and show that there really
is a statistical enhancement in the density of galaxies in all directions from that center.
Lellana encovers as many well known structures previously found by astronomers, such as
the Harvard Smithsonian Great Wall containing the Coma cluster, the Hercules cluster, and
the Slowing Great Wall, the Boeties supercluster resides at its center. Computer simulations
have demonstrated that the shell structure identified as or Orlelana as less than a one
percent probability of being a statistical accident. Alilana has all the properties of a
theoretically anticipated baryonic acoustic oscillation, including the prominence of a rich supercluster at its
center. However, it does stand out stronger than expect. Also, a
Elana is slightly larger than anticipated based on the theory of the Standard Model of
cosmology, but the size isn't accord with observations of the local expansion rate of
the universe and of galaxy flows on large scales. That also hinted subtle problems
with the Standard Model. This space time and Time that to take a brief
look at some of the other stories making us in science this week with the
Science Report. A new study has found a worrying change in the Indian Ocean
surface temperatures, which are putting Southeast Australia on course for what it expected to
be increasingly hot and dry conditions. The Indian Ocean dipole was found to be
a major contributor to the severe drought and record hot temperatures seen across Australia last
year. The event, known as a positive Indian Ocean dipole, cut off
one of the major sources for Southern Australia's winter and spring rains. It also
set up the extremely hot and dry conditions which promoted the Black Summer bush fires
of twenty nineteen and twenty twenty. The new research are reported in the journal
Nature Reveals that these historically rare events have become far more frequent and intense over
the past century, and the situation is expected to continue to worsen if greenhouse
gas emissions continue to rise. To reach their conclusions, scientists used coral records
from the eastern equatorial Indian Ocean to reconstruct Indian Ocean dipole variability over the last
millennium with unprecedented precision, and the authors found that historically strong events like last
year were incredibly rare. In fact, since the year twelve forty, scientists
could identify only ten of these extreme events, but four of those ten took
place in the last sixty years. The research also showed that a persistent tight
coupling has existed between the variability of the Indian Ocean dipole and the Elnino southern
oscillation in the Pacific Ocean during the last millennium. While the Indian Ocean dipole
and El Nino events can occur independently, periods of large year to year swings
in the Indian oation variability also heightened Elno's southern oscillation variability across in the Pacific.
Scientists have shown how the Black Death made the human immune system what it
is today. Infectious diseases are one of the strongest drivers of human evolution,
and a pandemic can cause the genes involved in immune responses to evolve rapidly.
The study, reported in the journal Nature, analyzed ancient DNA samples from five
hundred and sixteen individuals, all of whom died about the time of the Black
Death in the fourteenth century. They identified two hundred and forty five genetic variants.
They are all very different when comparing pre and post Black Death samples.
The variance associated with protection from Black Death bacterium overlap with genes associated with increased
susceptibility to autoimmune diseases. The authors say this highlights the contribution of a natural
selection of present day susceptibility towards chronic inflammatory and autoimmune diseases. The Black Death
is considered the deadliest plague to be recorded in human history, causing the deaths
of somewhere between seventy five million and two hundred million people. The pestilence was
a bubonic plague pandemic which infected western Eurasia countries as well as northern Africa between
thirteen forty six and thirteen fifty three. The Black Death is estimated to have
killed between thirty and sixty percent of the European population, as well as a
third of the population of the Middle East. It's caused by the bacterium Yeshinia
pests, which is spread by fleas, but it can also take a secondary
form, or it's spread through a person to person contact by aerosols, causing
neneumonic plagues. The plague created religious, social, and economic upheavals with profound
effects on the course of European history. The pandemics thought of originated either from
Central or Eastern Asia, but its first definitive appearance was in the Crimea in
thirteen forty seven. From Crimea, it was most likely carried by fleas living
on black rats. These traveled on Genoese trading ships, spreading throughout the Mediterranean
Basin and reaching North Africa, Western Asia, and the rest of Europe through
Constantinople, Sicily and the Italian Peninsula. There's evidence that once it came ashore,
black death quickly spread person to person as inneumonic plague, and of course
it wasn't just a single event. There were further outbreaks throughout the later Middle
Ages, even continuing right through to the early nineteenth century. Sist of the
black death include fever, headaches, painful aching joints, nausea with vomiting,
a general feeling of malaise, and the appearance of buboes in the groin,
neck, and armpits which use pass and blood when opened. Left untreated,
eighty percent of those who contracted bubonic plague would die within eight days. Siters
have found that baling whales around the coast of California are estimated to ingest up
to ten million pieces of microplastics every day. The findings were reported in the
journal Nature Communications. Combine microplastic data from the California Current with high resolution foraging
behavior measurements from one hundred and ninety one TAGG baling whales, including blue fin
and humpback whales. They found that baling whales mainly fit at depths of fifty
to two hundred and fifty meters and that just happens to be where most microplastics
are found now. Based on their measurements, the authors estimate that blue wales
could consume up to ten million microplastic pieces every day, while humpback whales will
still be consuming around four million pieces daily. The findings suggests that baaliing whales
may consume the most plastic of any organisms, and that microplastics could pose a
far greater risk to these whales than previously thought. There's growing concern in the
international community about the honesty and trustworthiness of the World Health Organization, the world's
most powerful health authority, recently celebrated at seventy fifth birthday. The WHO was
originally set up by the United Nations to fight global diseases and provide medical treatments
to underdeveloped in Third world countries, but according to the medical Fraternity, the
WHO appears to have lost its way. In recent years. It's been pushing
dangerous pseudo scientific treatments, including alternative medicine practices such as nature apathy, traditional
Chinese medicine, homeopathy, and a uvetic treatments. The situation grew worse after
t Dross, a former guerrilla in Ethiopius socialist Tigray People's Liberation Front, became
WHO Director General with the backing of the Chinese government. Then, in twenty
seventeen, t Dross appointed Zimbabwe's asked that socialist President Robert mcgabe to serve as
a WHO goodwill Ambassador mcgabe, a self described Marxist Leninist, had by this
stage been accused by the European Union, the Innited Nations Security Council, the
Human Rights Watch and the Zimbabwe Council of Churches of being a dictator and responsible
for economic mismanagement and widespread corruption, as well as human rights abuses, including
anti white racism and crimes against humanity. It was also on the ted Dross
in twenty twenty that the WHO ignored warnings from front line doctors about a fast
spreading new pandemic in China, which later became known as COVID nineteen. This
failure to respond gave the deadly virus the time it needed to quickly spread globally,
killing an estimated eighteen million people so far. To amend them from a
strange skeptics says, now, instead of focusing on the provision of medical care
to those who need it, the WHO is again promoting dangerous pseudo scientific treatments.
In most cases, we's done a great job. It's been so instrumental
in treating sort of diseases around the world, especially in the world countries of
vaccimation and that sort of thing. So it's a very important body, so
to see it going in certain directions is a worry. And over the last
decade or so there have been signs, and they've sort of started off with
the promotion of traditional Chinese medicine, saying that this is a valid part of
medicine and should be regarded as part of normal treatments, et cetera. So
it's given the intromater of the who there's so much in traditional Chinese medicine which
is frankly which doctor stuff here is it's just magical thinking pretending to be ancient
medicine or something. But most of it's just sort of something You take some
of the stuff that's in there and you develop it and l like you do
with any sort of actual product, and you find the actual working product.
But most of traditional medicine is based on very ready uncientific theories. Okay,
that's one aspect. At the same time, it's been pushing naturopathy, which
is definitely magical thinking about the spirit of the body helping you cure, et
cetera, and that promotes the whole range of pseudo sciences as well, and
homeopathy. Will think the homeopathy is jumps another way of saying it. It
can't work, it doesn't work, it shouldn't work, and it doesn't work.
So I mean the WHO to be pushing that. Now, there's a
lot of conspiracy theories about it, the reasons why the person who was running
WHO for a while he was pushing Chinese medicine, and other suggestions that China
is a big thunder of the WHO, so they're trying to plaque eate a
Chinese approach to medicine. We've certainly seen Chinese involvement in administration of the WHO
of lateran the WH refused to acknowledge the problems of COVID nineteen until very late.
It was one of its great feelings and that was brought about by pressure
by the Chinese government. Yeah so yeah, we can probably say there's the
pressure from the Chinese government on a whole range of areas of medicine. I've
spoken to a number of people in Australia who are concerned about influence on research
activities, funding and control and sort of pushing certain areas before you're in for
I had a Nobel Prize with her who said that to me, it's a
concern and the concern of where the WHO is heading by trying to be a
bit too inclusive. Now the reasons for that was up to everybody to figure
out, but certainly the very factor of actually endorsing and saying that these things
are valid when they're not, and coming from such an august body is a
real worry and it's an ongoing worrying. We have been sort of mentioning it
ourselves, but so is the world basically that is really concerned about this.
That's temendum from Australian skeptics, and that's the show for now. Space Time
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