WEBVTT 1 00:00:03.399 --> 00:00:07.719 Welcome to Bedtime Astronomy. Explore the wonders of the cosmos 2 00:00:07.759 --> 00:00:12.279 with our soothing Bedtime Astronomie podcast. Each episode offers a 3 00:00:12.359 --> 00:00:16.320 gentle journey through the stars, planets, and beyond, perfect for 4 00:00:16.399 --> 00:00:20.239 unwinding after a long day. Let's travel through the mysteries 5 00:00:20.239 --> 00:00:22.440 of the universe as you drift off into a peaceful 6 00:00:22.480 --> 00:00:23.399 slumber under. 7 00:00:23.199 --> 00:00:23.800 The night sky. 8 00:00:26.920 --> 00:00:29.000 So I want you to just imagine for a second, 9 00:00:29.079 --> 00:00:32.359 stepping outside on a really crisp, clear. 10 00:00:32.359 --> 00:00:34.280 Night mm hm, the kind of where the stars just 11 00:00:34.359 --> 00:00:34.679 kind of. 12 00:00:34.600 --> 00:00:37.439 Pop exactly, and you look up and you find the 13 00:00:37.439 --> 00:00:39.240 constellation Orion. 14 00:00:39.079 --> 00:00:40.679 Right, highly recognizable. 15 00:00:40.759 --> 00:00:43.479 Yeah, and you look at Orion's right shoulder, that glowing 16 00:00:43.840 --> 00:00:48.840 kind of reddish orange dot, beetle goose, beetlejuice. Right. Humanity 17 00:00:48.880 --> 00:00:52.079 has been staring at the specific star for millennia, But 18 00:00:52.200 --> 00:00:56.439 it turns out it's been keeping this absolutely massive secret, 19 00:00:56.600 --> 00:00:57.640 a really massive one. 20 00:00:57.719 --> 00:00:58.119 Yeah. 21 00:00:58.159 --> 00:01:00.399 I mean, think about it this way. If you took 22 00:01:00.479 --> 00:01:04.719 our sun, the blindingly bright center of our entire solar system, 23 00:01:05.000 --> 00:01:07.799 and you just dropped it right next to Beetlejuice, our 24 00:01:07.959 --> 00:01:10.239 Sun would be completely invisible. 25 00:01:10.040 --> 00:01:12.280 Entirely erased by the glare, right. 26 00:01:12.079 --> 00:01:13.719 You wouldn't be able to see it with the naked eye, 27 00:01:13.799 --> 00:01:15.640 and honestly, you would struggle to see it with our 28 00:01:15.680 --> 00:01:20.599 most advanced telescopes, which kind of explains this really uncomfortable 29 00:01:20.640 --> 00:01:22.200 reality in modern astronomy. 30 00:01:22.280 --> 00:01:24.280 It's very humbling, honestly, totally. 31 00:01:24.799 --> 00:01:27.640 For the last hundred years, a massive star up to 32 00:01:27.719 --> 00:01:30.280 three times the size of our Sun has just been 33 00:01:30.400 --> 00:01:35.040 hiding in plain sight right there, orbiting Orion's shoulder, and. 34 00:01:34.920 --> 00:01:37.439 We didn't definitively find it until right now. 35 00:01:37.560 --> 00:01:41.959 It's wild. So today we're unpacking the stunning conclusion to 36 00:01:42.079 --> 00:01:46.079 this century long astronomical quest. We are breaking down the 37 00:01:46.159 --> 00:01:50.879 definitive discovery of batel gouse b, the hidden companion star, Yeah, 38 00:01:51.000 --> 00:01:54.640 the hidden companion. We're going to track the historical suspicions, 39 00:01:54.680 --> 00:01:56.519 like why we even thought there was a hidden star 40 00:01:56.560 --> 00:01:57.439 in the first place. 41 00:01:57.280 --> 00:01:59.560 Right, because the clues were always there exactly. 42 00:02:00.000 --> 00:02:02.959 I will analyze the mechanics of that crazy false alarm 43 00:02:02.959 --> 00:02:04.040 from a few years ago. 44 00:02:03.959 --> 00:02:06.840 Oh, the great dimming when everyone thought it was going to. 45 00:02:06.799 --> 00:02:10.680 Explode, Yes, when everyone was panicking about a supernova. And 46 00:02:10.719 --> 00:02:14.080 then we're going deep into the specific optical physics and 47 00:02:14.120 --> 00:02:18.080 the planet hunting technology that finally allowed astronomers in the 48 00:02:18.120 --> 00:02:21.520 Atacoma Desert to capture a direct image of this thing. 49 00:02:21.599 --> 00:02:25.039 Because the implications here they go far beyond just solving 50 00:02:25.080 --> 00:02:28.199 an old mystery. Oh, for sure, finding a companion star 51 00:02:28.319 --> 00:02:31.439 of this magnitude hiding in the glare of a highly 52 00:02:31.479 --> 00:02:35.639 evolved supergen in it introduces a whole new set of 53 00:02:35.680 --> 00:02:40.400 incredibly high stakes physics. The eventual death of Beetlegoose, which 54 00:02:40.439 --> 00:02:43.240 we know is coming, is going to be fundamentally altered 55 00:02:43.240 --> 00:02:44.400 by the presence of this neighbor. 56 00:02:44.639 --> 00:02:48.080 So to understand why finding beetlejuice Bee is such a 57 00:02:48.120 --> 00:02:51.800 massive paradigm shift, we really have to establish the baseline 58 00:02:51.840 --> 00:02:53.080 of Beatleges itself. 59 00:02:53.360 --> 00:02:54.960 Yeah, we have to talk about the scale. 60 00:02:55.000 --> 00:02:57.080 The scale is just it's hard to wrap your head around. 61 00:02:57.479 --> 00:03:00.400 The reason astronomers have spent nearly a century frustrat by 62 00:03:00.400 --> 00:03:04.199 the star comes down to sheer physical dominance. It's a 63 00:03:04.280 --> 00:03:07.560 red supergin, right. If you dropped Batylviews into the center 64 00:03:07.639 --> 00:03:10.680 of our Solar system, its surface would extend out past 65 00:03:10.719 --> 00:03:11.560 the orbit of Jupiter. 66 00:03:11.800 --> 00:03:12.680 Just swallows everything. 67 00:03:12.759 --> 00:03:17.400 Yeah, Mercury, Venus, Earth, Mars, the asteroid belt all completely 68 00:03:17.680 --> 00:03:19.800 gone inside the star, and that. 69 00:03:19.840 --> 00:03:23.080 Scale dictates everything about how we observe it. We are 70 00:03:23.159 --> 00:03:27.280 dealing with a bloated, highly evolved star that's in the 71 00:03:27.319 --> 00:03:28.680 final stages of its life cycle. 72 00:03:28.759 --> 00:03:30.479 Right, it's running out of gas exactly. 73 00:03:30.840 --> 00:03:33.759 And because it's so massive and relatively close to us, 74 00:03:34.479 --> 00:03:36.919 I mean roughly six hundred and fifty light years away, 75 00:03:37.439 --> 00:03:39.319 it is one of the brightest objects in our. 76 00:03:39.280 --> 00:03:42.680 Sky, with that really unmistakable reddish orange color. 77 00:03:43.080 --> 00:03:47.719 Right. But the defining characteristic of Beetlejuice, the quirk that 78 00:03:47.759 --> 00:03:51.319 caught the attention of everyone from ancient aboriginal astronomers to 79 00:03:51.960 --> 00:03:56.039 like Sir John Herschel in the eighteen thirties, is its variability. 80 00:03:56.120 --> 00:03:57.159 It doesn't just sit there. 81 00:03:57.360 --> 00:03:59.039 No, It's brightness is not constant. 82 00:03:59.199 --> 00:04:02.840 It dims and brightens. And the crucial detail here, the 83 00:04:02.879 --> 00:04:05.639 thing that really kicked off this whole century long hunt, 84 00:04:06.240 --> 00:04:09.719 is that it doesn't just flicker randomly. There's a rhythm 85 00:04:09.759 --> 00:04:10.000 to it. 86 00:04:10.159 --> 00:04:13.439 Yeah. In atrophysics, when you plot a star's light curve, 87 00:04:13.800 --> 00:04:16.079 you know the graph of its brightness over time, and 88 00:04:16.120 --> 00:04:20.199 you see a repeating, predictable variation, it's a massive red flag. 89 00:04:20.279 --> 00:04:22.439 It signals a mechanical cycle exactly. 90 00:04:22.480 --> 00:04:25.279 The star of that magnitude doesn't just change its luminous 91 00:04:25.319 --> 00:04:27.720 output on a strict schedule without a physical driver. 92 00:04:27.800 --> 00:04:29.720 Think of it like this. Say you look out your 93 00:04:29.720 --> 00:04:32.199 window right, and the street light at the end of 94 00:04:32.199 --> 00:04:32.839 your block. 95 00:04:32.680 --> 00:04:34.319 Is flickering completely randomly. 96 00:04:34.439 --> 00:04:37.040 Yeah, if it's random, you just assume the internal mechanism 97 00:04:37.160 --> 00:04:39.600 is breaking down. It's a dying bulb. But if you 98 00:04:39.639 --> 00:04:42.240 sit there with a stockwatch and you time it, and 99 00:04:42.279 --> 00:04:44.959 you realize that street light is dimming on a precise, 100 00:04:45.120 --> 00:04:49.279 predictable schedule, like say, every four hundred days, like clockwork, 101 00:04:49.560 --> 00:04:50.680 you stop blaming the bolt. 102 00:04:50.879 --> 00:04:52.680 Right. You assume someone is messing. 103 00:04:52.399 --> 00:04:55.399 With the power exactly. You assume a neighbor is routinely 104 00:04:55.480 --> 00:04:59.720 tapping the power line. And for roughly a century, astronomers 105 00:04:59.720 --> 00:05:03.439 looking at the periodicity of Biddle Juice's brightness suspected a 106 00:05:03.519 --> 00:05:05.480 stellar neighbor was tapping the line. 107 00:05:05.839 --> 00:05:09.480 Right. The hypothesis was that as a smaller companion star 108 00:05:09.959 --> 00:05:13.360 orbited the supergent, its gravity would tug on the larger star. 109 00:05:13.920 --> 00:05:17.000 Or maybe it was periodically passing through the outer layers 110 00:05:17.000 --> 00:05:19.079 of the supergen's extended atmosphere. 111 00:05:19.160 --> 00:05:21.959 Yeah, exactly, creating those rhythmic dips in the light. We 112 00:05:22.000 --> 00:05:22.759 receive on Earth. 113 00:05:22.879 --> 00:05:26.399 But the frustration here, like the maddening part for astronomers, 114 00:05:26.680 --> 00:05:30.079 is the gap between mathematical suspicion and visual confirmation. 115 00:05:30.279 --> 00:05:31.079 Oh it's the worst. 116 00:05:31.160 --> 00:05:33.040 You can have the light curves, you can track the 117 00:05:33.079 --> 00:05:36.360 scheduled flicker, but no matter how much you upgrade your lenses, 118 00:05:36.839 --> 00:05:40.279 the culprit remains completely invisible because. 119 00:05:40.000 --> 00:05:43.920 Of the sheer luminosity of beetlejuice. I mean, the supurgeon 120 00:05:44.079 --> 00:05:47.040 is pumping out something like one hundred thousand times more 121 00:05:47.079 --> 00:05:51.680 photons than our sun. That's it's blinding. Yeah, that contrast 122 00:05:51.800 --> 00:05:56.480 ratio is the primary enemy of observational astronomy. When you're 123 00:05:56.519 --> 00:05:59.519 trying to image a faint object next to an incredibly 124 00:05:59.519 --> 00:06:04.240 bright one, the photons from the bright object literally spill 125 00:06:04.319 --> 00:06:06.120 over the pixels on your detector. 126 00:06:06.279 --> 00:06:09.120 It just washes out the faint signal entirely completely. 127 00:06:09.160 --> 00:06:12.240 So the companion was basically trapped in the mathematical realm. 128 00:06:12.560 --> 00:06:15.439 We could see the gravitational footprints it was leaving on beetlejuice, 129 00:06:15.800 --> 00:06:17.639 but we couldn't actually see the star making them. 130 00:06:17.720 --> 00:06:20.560 Okay, let's actually get into the mechanics of those footprints, 131 00:06:20.920 --> 00:06:23.199 because before they get to the direct image. They knew 132 00:06:23.199 --> 00:06:27.199 something was there through something called radial velocity. So how 133 00:06:27.279 --> 00:06:31.240 exactly does a hidden star leave a measurable footprint in 134 00:06:31.279 --> 00:06:32.319 the light of the main star. 135 00:06:32.639 --> 00:06:34.720 It really all comes down to the Doppler effect, but 136 00:06:35.079 --> 00:06:36.360 applied to starlight. 137 00:06:36.600 --> 00:06:39.720 Okay, like a police siren changing pitch when it drives 138 00:06:39.759 --> 00:06:40.160 past you. 139 00:06:40.519 --> 00:06:44.399 Precisely. So, when two stars orbit each other, they don't 140 00:06:44.399 --> 00:06:46.720 actually just have one sitting still while the other goes 141 00:06:46.759 --> 00:06:50.680 around it. They orbit their common center of mass, which 142 00:06:50.680 --> 00:06:53.959 we call the Berry center. Right now, even though battle 143 00:06:54.000 --> 00:06:58.279 Juice is immensely massive, the companion still exerts a gravitational 144 00:06:58.319 --> 00:07:01.720 pull on it, and this causes Bettle Juwe to wobble 145 00:07:01.800 --> 00:07:03.720 slightly as it moves through space. 146 00:07:03.920 --> 00:07:06.160 So they're both doing this kind of slightly off center 147 00:07:06.240 --> 00:07:08.639 waltz together exactly, Yeah. 148 00:07:08.279 --> 00:07:12.319 And we can measure that wobble using spectroscopy. We take 149 00:07:12.319 --> 00:07:14.079 the light from Batel Duice and we spread it out 150 00:07:14.120 --> 00:07:15.279 into a spectrum like. 151 00:07:15.240 --> 00:07:17.439 A rainbow, like shining it through a prism. 152 00:07:17.360 --> 00:07:20.959 Right and in that spectrum there are dark lines absorption 153 00:07:21.079 --> 00:07:24.399 lines that are created by specific elements in the star's 154 00:07:24.399 --> 00:07:29.279 atmosphere absorbing specific wavelengths of light, like a barcode perfect analogy. Yeah, 155 00:07:29.319 --> 00:07:32.839 a barcode as bettle juice wobbles toward Earth, those barcode 156 00:07:32.839 --> 00:07:35.240 lines shift slightly toward the blue end of the spectrum 157 00:07:35.480 --> 00:07:36.800 because the light waves are getting. 158 00:07:36.600 --> 00:07:39.519 Compressed, and then as it wobbles away from us. 159 00:07:39.480 --> 00:07:41.560 The lines shift toward the red end because the waves 160 00:07:41.600 --> 00:07:42.519 are getting stretched out. 161 00:07:42.879 --> 00:07:47.480 So by meticulously tracking how those dark barcode lines slide 162 00:07:47.480 --> 00:07:52.040 back and forth over decades of observation, astronomers could calculate 163 00:07:52.079 --> 00:07:57.120 the exact gravitational pull required to cause that specific wobble exactly. 164 00:07:57.199 --> 00:08:02.040 They basically mapped the invisible orbit, could determined the orbital period, 165 00:08:02.480 --> 00:08:06.120 the eccentricity of the orbit, and theoretically, the mass of 166 00:08:06.160 --> 00:08:08.839 the hidden companion that had to be causing the wobble. 167 00:08:08.879 --> 00:08:10.439 Okay, but wait, I'm going to push back on this 168 00:08:10.519 --> 00:08:13.240 right here. Sure you just said they use this radial 169 00:08:13.319 --> 00:08:16.759 velocity data to calculate the mass of the companion, and 170 00:08:16.839 --> 00:08:20.399 based on that math, for years, the astronomical community predicted 171 00:08:20.399 --> 00:08:23.279 the companion would be roughly one solar mass, so about 172 00:08:23.279 --> 00:08:25.480 the size of our Sun. Right, but the brand new 173 00:08:25.560 --> 00:08:28.160 discovery that we're talking about today confirmed the star is 174 00:08:28.199 --> 00:08:30.040 actually two to three times that. 175 00:08:29.920 --> 00:08:31.199 Mass, yeah, much bigger. 176 00:08:31.399 --> 00:08:34.519 So how can the spectroscopic math be so perfectly accurate 177 00:08:34.559 --> 00:08:37.600 about the orbit and the location but miss the actual 178 00:08:37.639 --> 00:08:39.559 mass of the object by a factor of three? 179 00:08:39.799 --> 00:08:42.399 Ah. That points to one of the most notorious ambiguities 180 00:08:42.440 --> 00:08:46.000 in all of astrophysics. It's called the inclination angle, or 181 00:08:46.039 --> 00:08:48.559 often the sign do degeneracy. 182 00:08:48.840 --> 00:08:50.879 Okay, break that down for us. Why does the angle 183 00:08:50.919 --> 00:08:51.720 matter so much? 184 00:08:52.039 --> 00:08:56.000 Well, radio velocity only measures movement along our specific line 185 00:08:56.000 --> 00:08:59.200 of sight, so directly toward us or directly away from us, right, 186 00:08:59.440 --> 00:09:04.200 It tells us absolutely nothing about the star's movement up, down, left, right, 187 00:09:04.200 --> 00:09:04.840 across the sky. 188 00:09:05.240 --> 00:09:07.639 Okay, So imagine you're looking at a Merry Go Round. 189 00:09:07.919 --> 00:09:09.080 Yes, perfect, If you're. 190 00:09:09.000 --> 00:09:11.759 Looking at it perfectly edge on, you can clearly see 191 00:09:11.759 --> 00:09:14.440 the horses moving directly toward you and directly away from 192 00:09:14.480 --> 00:09:15.360 you exactly. 193 00:09:15.399 --> 00:09:18.039 That is a ninety degree inclination. You're getting the full 194 00:09:18.120 --> 00:09:18.960 velocity measurement. 195 00:09:19.399 --> 00:09:22.320 But if I'm hovering in a helicopter looking at that 196 00:09:22.360 --> 00:09:25.519 same Merry Go Round from directly above, so a zero 197 00:09:25.559 --> 00:09:28.559 degree inclination, the horses are just moving in a circle 198 00:09:28.600 --> 00:09:29.679 across my field of view. 199 00:09:29.759 --> 00:09:32.240 They are never moving towards you or away from you right, 200 00:09:32.559 --> 00:09:36.000 and therefore your radio velocity measurement would be zero, even 201 00:09:36.039 --> 00:09:37.720 though the Merry Go Round is spinning rapidly. 202 00:09:37.879 --> 00:09:38.480 Oh wow. 203 00:09:38.679 --> 00:09:41.480 Yeah, So when we look at a binary star system 204 00:09:41.480 --> 00:09:45.159 out in deep space, we almost never know the exact 205 00:09:45.200 --> 00:09:49.360 tilt of the orbit relative to Earth. The spectroscopic wobble 206 00:09:49.559 --> 00:09:52.960 only gives us the minimum possible mass of the companion. 207 00:09:52.600 --> 00:09:55.159 Because if the orbit is tilted relative to our line 208 00:09:55.200 --> 00:09:58.159 of sight, the true mass has to be higher to 209 00:09:58.200 --> 00:09:59.679 produce the wobble we're measuring. 210 00:10:00.039 --> 00:10:03.919 Ailed it. The astronomers who predicted a one solar mass 211 00:10:03.960 --> 00:10:08.480 companion assumed a fairly edge on orbit. But because Beetlejew's 212 00:10:08.480 --> 00:10:12.000 b turned out to be nearly three solar masses, we 213 00:10:12.120 --> 00:10:14.840 now know the orbit must be significantly tilted. 214 00:10:15.039 --> 00:10:17.519 So the math wasn't wrong. It was just incomplete due 215 00:10:17.519 --> 00:10:19.120 to our fixed vantage point in. 216 00:10:19.080 --> 00:10:21.279 The cosmo exactly we're stuck here on Earth. 217 00:10:21.559 --> 00:10:25.799 It's fascinating how a physical limitation of our perspective entirely 218 00:10:25.960 --> 00:10:28.559 masked the true nature of the star for one hundred years. 219 00:10:28.639 --> 00:10:30.919 It really is, and it's wild because just as researchers 220 00:10:30.960 --> 00:10:34.720 were aggressively dialing in on these orbital predictions, Beetle Jews 221 00:10:34.840 --> 00:10:39.039 decided to throw this massive curveball that derailed the hunt 222 00:10:39.080 --> 00:10:41.679 and triggered a global panic. Oh yes, we have to 223 00:10:41.679 --> 00:10:42.679 talk about the great dimming. 224 00:10:42.960 --> 00:10:45.559 This is such a critical chapter in the story because 225 00:10:45.600 --> 00:10:49.159 it highlights just how volatile red supergins are and it 226 00:10:49.240 --> 00:10:53.080 perfectly sets the stage for the specific team that ultimately 227 00:10:53.120 --> 00:10:53.960 found the companion. 228 00:10:54.120 --> 00:10:56.879 Right, So, a few years ago Beetle Jews underwent this 229 00:10:56.960 --> 00:10:59.440 completely unprecedented drop in luminosity. 230 00:11:00.120 --> 00:11:02.840 Is visible to the naked eye. Anyone could go outside 231 00:11:02.840 --> 00:11:03.279 and see it. 232 00:11:03.679 --> 00:11:06.279 The star lost a massive fraction of its brightness in 233 00:11:06.320 --> 00:11:09.879 a matter of weeks, and I remember the absolute frenzy 234 00:11:09.879 --> 00:11:11.200 in the astronomical community. 235 00:11:11.240 --> 00:11:12.679 Oh, Twitter was going crazy. 236 00:11:12.399 --> 00:11:16.519 Because Beetlejewice is a known ticking time bomb. It has 237 00:11:16.600 --> 00:11:20.720 exhausted the hydrogen fuel in its core, it's burning heavier elements, 238 00:11:20.960 --> 00:11:22.639 and it is on a one way trip to a 239 00:11:22.720 --> 00:11:24.080 core collapse supernova. 240 00:11:24.320 --> 00:11:27.600 Right, And when a star with that specific doomed profile 241 00:11:27.720 --> 00:11:30.840 suddenly drops in brightness, the immediate assumption is that the 242 00:11:30.879 --> 00:11:31.399 engine is. 243 00:11:31.360 --> 00:11:34.159 Failing, core is destabilizing. 244 00:11:33.480 --> 00:11:35.279 Exactly, the explosion is imminent. 245 00:11:35.440 --> 00:11:38.080 So the scientific tension centered on whether we were witnessing 246 00:11:38.159 --> 00:11:40.559 an intrinsic change or an extrinsic change. 247 00:11:40.600 --> 00:11:44.679 Right, Yes, an intrinsic change would mean the internal thermodynamics 248 00:11:44.679 --> 00:11:48.000 of the star were actually failing, like perhaps the outward 249 00:11:48.080 --> 00:11:50.919 radiation pressure that holds the star against its own gravity 250 00:11:50.919 --> 00:11:52.240 had suddenly dropped. 251 00:11:51.919 --> 00:11:54.279 Which is the precursor to collapse exactly. 252 00:11:54.879 --> 00:11:57.679 But an extrinsic change would mean the star's internal engine 253 00:11:57.679 --> 00:12:01.360 was totally fine, but something physical moved between the star 254 00:12:01.600 --> 00:12:04.279 and our telescopes, basically blocking the photons. 255 00:12:04.600 --> 00:12:07.960 So to solve this, French researcher Miguel Montage and his 256 00:12:08.039 --> 00:12:12.559 team secured observation time on the very large telescope the VLT, 257 00:12:12.799 --> 00:12:15.480 down in Chile, and they didn't just measure the light. 258 00:12:15.559 --> 00:12:18.480 They actually managed to resolve the surface of Beetlejuice to 259 00:12:18.480 --> 00:12:19.799 see what was happening. 260 00:12:19.519 --> 00:12:22.840 Which is incredible. Resolving the surface of any star other 261 00:12:22.879 --> 00:12:26.480 than our own sun is an extreme technical achievement. 262 00:12:26.000 --> 00:12:27.600 Because they're usually just points of light. 263 00:12:27.720 --> 00:12:30.320 Right, Yes, even the biggest telescopes usually you see a dot. 264 00:12:31.200 --> 00:12:35.440 But because Beetle Juice is so physically massive and relatively close, 265 00:12:35.960 --> 00:12:39.360 the VLT could capture its actual disc Wow, and what 266 00:12:39.519 --> 00:12:44.480 Montage's team discovered debunked the supernova panic completely. The dimming 267 00:12:44.679 --> 00:12:48.000 was not an internal collapse, it was a massive, localized 268 00:12:48.039 --> 00:12:49.120 extrinsic block. 269 00:12:49.320 --> 00:12:51.559 They found out the star had essentially burped out a 270 00:12:51.559 --> 00:12:52.799 massive cloud of gas. 271 00:12:52.919 --> 00:12:54.799 Yeah, a huge burp. We need to look at the 272 00:12:54.799 --> 00:12:57.799 flow dynamics of a red supergent to understand how violent 273 00:12:57.840 --> 00:12:58.759 that burp actually was. 274 00:12:58.799 --> 00:12:59.679 Okay, set the scene. 275 00:13:00.039 --> 00:13:04.279 So, Unlike our Sun, which has millions of relatively small 276 00:13:04.360 --> 00:13:06.639 convection cells boiling on its surface kind of like a 277 00:13:06.639 --> 00:13:11.240 pot of boiling water, a bloated supergent, like beetlejuice, has 278 00:13:11.320 --> 00:13:16.279 convection cells that are just staggeringly huge. A single one 279 00:13:16.480 --> 00:13:19.679 can cover a huge fraction of the star's entire surface. 280 00:13:20.039 --> 00:13:23.159 We are talking about bubbles of boiling plasma the size 281 00:13:23.159 --> 00:13:24.200 of our inner solar systm. 282 00:13:24.240 --> 00:13:26.000 Wait, really just one bubble, Just. 283 00:13:26.039 --> 00:13:29.440 One bubble rising from the interior, releasing heat and sinking 284 00:13:29.480 --> 00:13:29.919 back down. 285 00:13:30.000 --> 00:13:32.879 Okay, So one of these colossal convection cells breaches the 286 00:13:32.919 --> 00:13:37.039 surface and violently ejects a massive plume of stellar material 287 00:13:37.159 --> 00:13:37.960 deep into space. 288 00:13:38.080 --> 00:13:41.000 Yes, a massive bubble of hot gas is blown off 289 00:13:41.000 --> 00:13:44.360 the star, and as this plume travels rapidly away from 290 00:13:44.360 --> 00:13:47.799 the intense heat the photosphere, the thermodynamics drop sharply. It 291 00:13:47.840 --> 00:13:50.480 cools down. It cools down very fast. And when stellar gas, 292 00:13:50.519 --> 00:13:54.159 which contains elements like silicon, oxygen, and carbon, cools past 293 00:13:54.159 --> 00:13:57.759 a specific temperature threshold, it undergoes a phase change. The 294 00:13:57.840 --> 00:14:00.559 gas condenses into solid particulates. 295 00:14:00.200 --> 00:14:02.799 So it quite literally turns into rock and soot in 296 00:14:02.840 --> 00:14:03.759 the vacuum of space. 297 00:14:04.159 --> 00:14:08.000 Exactly, it forms silicon dust. Yeah, and this immense cloud 298 00:14:08.039 --> 00:14:11.679 of newly formed dust happened to condense directly in our 299 00:14:11.759 --> 00:14:15.919 line of sight, physically eclipsing the southern hemisphere of the star. 300 00:14:16.279 --> 00:14:17.080 Unbelievable. 301 00:14:17.240 --> 00:14:20.399 It absorbed the visible light from Beetle jews and re 302 00:14:20.480 --> 00:14:24.159 emitted it in the infrared, which caused the dramatic dimming 303 00:14:24.240 --> 00:14:24.960 we saw on Earth. 304 00:14:25.080 --> 00:14:26.799 It basically created its own eclipse. 305 00:14:26.879 --> 00:14:31.759 Yeah, no, supernova, just localized atmospheric chaos, resulting in a 306 00:14:31.799 --> 00:14:32.360 dust cloud. 307 00:14:32.840 --> 00:14:35.399 Now, while that might have disappointed the people hoping to 308 00:14:35.440 --> 00:14:38.519 see a star explode in our lifetime, the scientific yield 309 00:14:38.600 --> 00:14:39.519 from that event. 310 00:14:39.320 --> 00:14:41.120 Was vital, oh absolutely crucial. 311 00:14:40.840 --> 00:14:44.080 Because it forced Montage and his team to become intimately 312 00:14:44.120 --> 00:14:46.480 familiar with the optical quirks of Beetle Juice. 313 00:14:46.559 --> 00:14:49.480 Right. They learned how to handle the overwhelming glare of 314 00:14:49.519 --> 00:14:52.399 its surface, how to process the noise in the data, 315 00:14:52.799 --> 00:14:55.360 and how to push the VLT to its absolute limits. 316 00:14:55.399 --> 00:14:58.559 They basically forged the exact specific skill set required to 317 00:14:58.639 --> 00:15:00.120 hunt down the companion star. 318 00:15:00.120 --> 00:15:03.759 Exactly, and once the dust cleared, literally, the focus shifted 319 00:15:03.879 --> 00:15:05.080 back to that century old. 320 00:15:04.879 --> 00:15:07.559 Mystery because the periodicity was still there, still there, the 321 00:15:07.679 --> 00:15:10.519 radial velocity wobble was still there, but they needed a 322 00:15:10.600 --> 00:15:14.559 highly specific window to actually attempt a direct observation. You 323 00:15:14.600 --> 00:15:17.679 can't just point the VLT at Beetlejuice on a random 324 00:15:17.720 --> 00:15:20.080 Tuesday and hope to spot the companion. 325 00:15:20.200 --> 00:15:21.759 No, you need a treasure map. 326 00:15:21.720 --> 00:15:25.720 Right, And in twenty twenty four, two robust astronomical studies 327 00:15:25.799 --> 00:15:27.320 essentially provided that map. 328 00:15:27.480 --> 00:15:32.200 They synthesized decades of astrometric and radial velocity data by 329 00:15:32.679 --> 00:15:36.840 meticulously mapping the gravitational wobble we talked about. They reconstructed 330 00:15:36.840 --> 00:15:37.879 the invisible orbit. 331 00:15:38.000 --> 00:15:41.519 They didn't just confirm the companion's existence, they calculated its 332 00:15:41.559 --> 00:15:43.120 exact orbital trajectory. 333 00:15:43.240 --> 00:15:46.240 Yes, and they predicted that in December of twenty twenty four, 334 00:15:46.720 --> 00:15:50.039 the companion would reach a very specific geometric point known 335 00:15:50.080 --> 00:15:51.960 as maximum elongation. 336 00:15:52.159 --> 00:15:54.679 Okay, this is the critical physical concept that made the 337 00:15:54.720 --> 00:15:58.559 discovery possible. Let's map out maximum elongation for everyone. Why 338 00:15:58.600 --> 00:16:01.639 does the physical distance the visual separation from the main 339 00:16:01.720 --> 00:16:04.360 star dictate whether or not we can see it. 340 00:16:04.360 --> 00:16:06.399 It comes right back to the contrast ratio and the 341 00:16:06.440 --> 00:16:09.799 physical limits of our optics. The anglier separation between the 342 00:16:09.799 --> 00:16:12.559 primary star and the companion, as viewed from Earth is 343 00:16:12.600 --> 00:16:13.799 incredibly small. 344 00:16:13.679 --> 00:16:15.840 Because they're six hundred and fifty light years away. 345 00:16:16.159 --> 00:16:19.039 Exactly so, when the companion is moving through the part 346 00:16:19.039 --> 00:16:21.120 of its orbit that brings it in front of or 347 00:16:21.120 --> 00:16:25.799 behind Beetle Juice, the angular separation is virtually zero. The 348 00:16:25.879 --> 00:16:29.159 light of the companion is entirely swallowed by the diffraction 349 00:16:29.320 --> 00:16:30.519 halo of the supergent. 350 00:16:30.679 --> 00:16:34.960 It's like trying to spot a single faint firefly buzzing 351 00:16:35.000 --> 00:16:39.039 around a massive stadium floodlight. Perfect If the firefly is 352 00:16:39.120 --> 00:16:41.919 hovering just an inch from the glass of the floodlight, 353 00:16:42.240 --> 00:16:45.840 it is completely consumed by the glare. You have absolutely 354 00:16:45.960 --> 00:16:48.759 zero chance of resolving the light of the insect against 355 00:16:48.799 --> 00:16:51.120 the millions of lumens pouring out of the bulb. Right 356 00:16:51.480 --> 00:16:53.840 your only hope is to wait for the exact moment 357 00:16:53.919 --> 00:16:56.200 the firefly flies a few feet away from the bulb 358 00:16:56.399 --> 00:16:59.000 out toward the very edge of the floodlight's beam. 359 00:16:59.000 --> 00:17:02.120 And maximum elong is that exact moment. It is the 360 00:17:02.159 --> 00:17:04.920 point in the orbit where the physical geometry places the 361 00:17:04.960 --> 00:17:08.720 companion at its widest possible apparent distance from the primary star. 362 00:17:09.119 --> 00:17:10.880 From our perspective here on Earth. 363 00:17:10.720 --> 00:17:13.880 It maximizes the angular separation. So the twenty twenty four 364 00:17:13.920 --> 00:17:17.559 mathematical models basically provided Montage and his team with a 365 00:17:17.640 --> 00:17:21.799 definitive deadline. They mapped the orbit and said the firefly 366 00:17:21.920 --> 00:17:24.160 will be at the edge of the floodlight's beam in 367 00:17:24.240 --> 00:17:27.400 December twenty twenty four. If you want to take a picture, 368 00:17:27.599 --> 00:17:30.119 this is your only window before the orbit carries it 369 00:17:30.160 --> 00:17:31.000 back into the glare. 370 00:17:31.279 --> 00:17:34.160 Yeah, we gave them the win, but knowing when to 371 00:17:34.279 --> 00:17:37.880 look is useless if you lack the optical hardware to 372 00:17:37.920 --> 00:17:40.680 overcome the fundamental physics of light diffraction. 373 00:17:40.440 --> 00:17:44.079 Which is where the story shifts to the engineering marvel 374 00:17:44.160 --> 00:17:48.039 of the VLT and a specific instrument called sphere. Yes, 375 00:17:48.200 --> 00:17:51.920 let's break down the VLT, the very Large telescope located 376 00:17:51.920 --> 00:17:55.640 in the Atacama Desert in Chile, the location itself is 377 00:17:55.680 --> 00:17:57.440 basically half the technology, right. 378 00:17:57.519 --> 00:17:59.920 Oh, absolutely, yeah. You need an environment that removes it 379 00:18:00.000 --> 00:18:03.000 as much of Earth's atmosphere from the equation as possible. 380 00:18:02.680 --> 00:18:04.960 Because atmosphere is the enemy of astronomy. 381 00:18:05.039 --> 00:18:07.720 The ATA comma is one of the highest driest environments 382 00:18:07.759 --> 00:18:11.680 on the planet. Atmospheric water vapor absorbs light and atmosphere 383 00:18:11.680 --> 00:18:15.359 turbulence you know, hot and cold pockets of air mixing 384 00:18:15.400 --> 00:18:17.240 together that bends and distorted starlight. 385 00:18:17.359 --> 00:18:20.599 It's what causes stars to twinkle, right, And for. 386 00:18:20.559 --> 00:18:24.119 An astronomer, trying to resolve a faint companion star next 387 00:18:24.160 --> 00:18:27.759 to a supergent twinkling is catastrophic. It smears the light 388 00:18:27.799 --> 00:18:28.799 all across the detector. 389 00:18:28.960 --> 00:18:31.039 But even in the auta comma, you still have some 390 00:18:31.200 --> 00:18:34.759 atmosphere to punch through. You're not in space, and more importantly, 391 00:18:34.880 --> 00:18:38.240 you still have the overwhelming blinding glare of beetle juice 392 00:18:38.279 --> 00:18:40.039 itself to deal with, which. 393 00:18:39.799 --> 00:18:42.920 Is where the sphere instrument comes in. Anthony Baccaletti, a 394 00:18:42.920 --> 00:18:45.880 co author on the new study, pointed out something really fascinating. 395 00:18:46.359 --> 00:18:49.759 Sphere was not designed to look at aging superdians. No, No, 396 00:18:49.880 --> 00:18:51.680 it is an exoplanet hunting tool. 397 00:18:51.799 --> 00:18:53.359 Oh Wow, so they repurposed it. 398 00:18:53.559 --> 00:18:56.880 Yeah, but the crossover an application is brilliant. Finding a 399 00:18:56.920 --> 00:19:00.799 Jupiter sized planet orbiting a distant stars the exact same 400 00:19:00.839 --> 00:19:04.799 optical challenge as finding a massive companion star orbiting an 401 00:19:04.880 --> 00:19:06.920