Speaker 1: Welcome to Bedtime Astronomy. Explore the wonders of the cosmos
Speaker 1: with our soothing Bedtime Astronomie podcast. Each episode offers a
Speaker 1: gentle journey through the stars, planets, and beyond, perfect for
Speaker 1: unwinding after a long day. Let's travel through the mysteries
Speaker 1: of the universe as you drift off into a peaceful
Speaker 1: slumber under the night sky.
Speaker 2: Imagine just for a moment, getting a package that this
Speaker 2: isn't from down the street or even another country. This
Speaker 2: package has traveled light years. It's a cosmic messenger straight
Speaker 2: from another star system, carrying secrets etched into its very atoms.
Speaker 2: After a journey across unimaginable distances, it arrives right here
Speaker 2: in our cosmic neighborhood. For centuries, I mean, this was
Speaker 2: pure science fiction, right, the stuff of dreams, maybe distant speculation.
Speaker 2: But today that thrilling idea isn't just fantasy anymore. It's well,
Speaker 2: it's real, a profound, undeniable reality. And astronomers they're not
Speaker 2: just watching these incredible visitors zoom past. Oh no, they're
Speaker 2: actually planning to meet them. So today we're going to
Speaker 2: embark on this extraordinary journey. We'll explore the really captivating
Speaker 2: story of these interstellar travelers, and we'll dig into a
Speaker 2: truly groundbreaking mission concept, one that could potentially fundamentally reshape
Speaker 2: how we understand the entire universe. Our goal here is
Speaker 2: to uncover how these mysterious objects are being found, why
Speaker 2: they hold such immense scientific importance, you know, for us
Speaker 2: here on Earth, and also how human ingenuity is just
Speaker 2: pushing the boundaries of what's possible, making a close encounter
Speaker 2: with one of these cosmic wanderers not just a hope,
Speaker 2: but well a meticulously planned, feasible reality. So get ready
Speaker 2: for some truly mind bending insights and a fascinating glimpse
Speaker 2: into the very near future of space exploration. Okay, let's
Speaker 2: kick things off by defining our terms a bit. What
Speaker 2: exactly are we talking about when we say interstellar object?
Speaker 2: How is it really different from the usual comets or
Speaker 2: asteroids we hear about, the ones that you know basically
Speaker 2: live here in our Solar System. It feels like a
Speaker 2: key distinction.
Speaker 3: It absolutely is, and it's a distinction with really profound implications.
Speaker 3: So when we talked about an interstellar object or an
Speaker 3: ISO for short, we mean a celestial body that genuinely
Speaker 3: originated outside of our solar system completely. These aren't things
Speaker 3: that formed around our Sun, you know, orbiting it for
Speaker 3: billions of years, like Earth or Jupiter or the asteroids
Speaker 3: we know. No, these objects they were born in a
Speaker 3: totally different star system, maybe one that's long gone or
Speaker 3: one we haven't even spotted yet. They've traveled across that vast,
Speaker 3: incredibly cold expanse of the galaxy and now, just for
Speaker 3: a fleeting cosmic moment, they're simply passing through our neighborhood
Speaker 3: before heading back out, which is, you know, a stark
Speaker 3: contrast almost everything else we track most comets and asteroids.
Speaker 3: They're gravitationally bound to our Sun. They're leftovers from the
Speaker 3: formation of our own little corner of the universe. And
Speaker 3: that word interstellar, it just carries so much weight, doesn't it.
Speaker 3: It means these aren't just local rocks or ice balls.
Speaker 3: They are true galactic wanderers, cosmic nomads, if you like.
Speaker 3: They were probably ejected from their homes.
Speaker 4: Sten maybe flung out by a close pass with a
Speaker 4: giant planet, or maybe during a chaotic dance in a
Speaker 4: binary star system, or perhaps ejected from a really young,
Speaker 4: turbulent star cluster. After that likely violent start, they've navigated
Speaker 4: the immense emptiness between stars for well possibly billions of years,
Speaker 4: and enduring the really harsh conditions of interstellar space. And
Speaker 4: here's the crucial part. They carry with them the unique,
Speaker 4: maybe even pristine, signatures of their distant alien homeland. You
Speaker 4: can also think of it like finding a bottle washed ashore,
Speaker 4: but instead of a note inside the bottle itself is
Speaker 4: the message like a tool or an artifact from unknown land,
Speaker 4: offering direct clues about where it came from. It's just
Speaker 4: an unprecedented chance to get direct insights into conditions far
Speaker 4: far beyond our own cosmic doorstep without ever having to
Speaker 4: actually travel there ourselves.
Speaker 2: That's incredible to think about. But for while millennia these
Speaker 2: things were just imagination. Then, almost like someone flipped a switch,
Speaker 2: we found the first one. What was that like? That
Speaker 2: moment in the scientific community. What made Omamu's discoveries so pivotal?
Speaker 2: Why did it kick off this whole new era?
Speaker 4: Oh, it was absolutely a momentous shift, almost like science
Speaker 4: fiction suddenly became science fact practically overnight. The community was
Speaker 4: well buzzing is an understatement, an absolute frenzy. The first
Speaker 4: officially recognized interstellar object, a comet in this case, was
Speaker 4: spotted back in twenty seventeen. It got the designation one
Speaker 4: I Umua. The one means it's the first ever found
Speaker 4: and the eye confirms that interstellar origin. And its name Umubuai.
Speaker 4: It's this beautiful Hawaiian word. It means something like a
Speaker 4: messenger from Afar arriving first.
Speaker 2: Wow.
Speaker 4: That's fitting, isn't it. It perfectly encapsulates its significance. It
Speaker 4: really was a pioneer, the vanguard this whole new class
Speaker 4: of objects we're now seeing. What immediately struck everyone about
Speaker 4: Umua was its shape, its extreme aspect ratio. Imagine something
Speaker 4: like well, a cosmic cigar, maybe ten times longer than
Speaker 4: it was wide, so really stretched out exactly, totally unlike
Speaker 4: anything we'd ever seen among our own Solar systems asteroids
Speaker 4: or comments, nothing even close. But beyond just its bizarre shape,
Speaker 4: oom Oomoa showed another really peculiar trait, a slight non
Speaker 4: gravitational acceleration.
Speaker 2: Meaning it wasn't just being pulled by the Sun's gravity,
Speaker 2: something else was pushing it.
Speaker 4: Precisely, it was being suddenly pushed by something else. Now
Speaker 4: that's typical for comments when they warm up and release gas,
Speaker 4: you know, outgassing. But and this is the real puzzle,
Speaker 4: the enigma oom Oomoa lacked any visible coma, that fuzzy
Speaker 4: atmosphere of gas and dust we expect from an active comet.
Speaker 4: It just wasn't there, or at least we couldn't see it.
Speaker 4: So these anomalies, the shape and the push without a
Speaker 4: visible coma led to intense scientific debate, I mean really intense.
Speaker 4: Theories range from it being a kind of dry, rocky fragment,
Speaker 4: maybe the core of a shredded planetoid, to much more
Speaker 4: speculative ideas, though ultimately unsupported, ideas like, you know, maybe
Speaker 4: it was artificial, an alien probe.
Speaker 2: Right, I remember hearing some of that speculation exactly.
Speaker 4: Scientists eventually kind of converged on explanations involving outgassing of
Speaker 4: something invisible to our telescope, like perhaps solid hydrogen or
Speaker 4: nitrogen ice, which wouldn't show up easily. But it fundamentally
Speaker 4: challenged our preconceived notions of what an interstellar visitor might
Speaker 4: look like or how it might behave its appearance. Just
Speaker 4: ignited this huge debate and really captured the public's imagination
Speaker 4: because it was so unique, so alien, it pushed our
Speaker 4: understanding right to the edge. Then just two years later,
Speaker 4: in twenty nineteen, we got the second one too, Borisov
Speaker 4: made its appearance.
Speaker 2: And that confirmed Umuwah wasn't just a one off.
Speaker 4: Precisely, Borisov's discovery was absolutely pivotal. It confirmed that Umamua
Speaker 4: wasn't just some bizarre, isolated fluke. It definitively established that, yes,
Speaker 4: interstellar objects are a real observable phenomenon. We weren't just
Speaker 4: incredibly lucky that one time. And interestingly, while Uma Mula
Speaker 4: was really weird in its appearance, Borisov looked much more
Speaker 4: like a traditional comet. It had a distinct coma. It
Speaker 4: behaved more like the comments we know, just one from
Speaker 4: somewhere else exactly, which in itself added to the picture
Speaker 4: showing the potential diversity among these cosmic tres. Some might
Speaker 4: be strange, others may be more familiar, just with an
Speaker 4: exotic origin. And now, just this year, twenty twenty five,
Speaker 4: we've had the third officially recognized ISC three idellas its
Speaker 4: detection made worldwide headlines. Again, it adds another crucial data
Speaker 4: point to this rapidly growing field, and it really underscores
Speaker 4: the idea that these objects are probably far more common
Speaker 4: than we ever dared to imagine. It truly feels like
Speaker 4: a new frontier opening up in astronomy.
Speaker 2: So, three official ones in just what eight years or
Speaker 2: so from zero? Does that mean they're actually rare fleeting events.
Speaker 2: We're just getting lucky spotting or something else going on.
Speaker 2: We're just getting way better at finding them. What's the
Speaker 2: future look like for finding more?
Speaker 4: Oh, it's definitely the latter. We are absolutely unequivocally getting
Speaker 4: much much better at finding them, and what we've seen
Speaker 4: so far, that's probably just the very beginning, like the
Speaker 4: first few drops before a real downpour. Scientists now estimate,
Speaker 4: based on pretty sophisticated models of how stars form an
Speaker 4: eject material, that numerous interstellar objects, once from outside our system,
Speaker 4: actually pass inside Earth's orbit every single year, every year,
Speaker 4: inside Earth's orbit, every single year, And if you expand
Speaker 4: the view out further, say to Neptune's orbit, the numbers
Speaker 4: get staggering. Perhaps this may as ten thousand such objects
Speaker 4: pass inside Neptune's orbit in any given year.
Speaker 2: Ten thousand pieces of other star systems.
Speaker 4: Ten thousand flying through our cosmic backyard, almost entirely unseen
Speaker 4: until very very recently. Think about that scale. It's a
Speaker 4: huge amount of cosmic traffic that we were essentially blind to.
Speaker 4: And the reason astronomers are so confident we'll discover many
Speaker 4: more isics over the next decade isn't just wishful thinking.
Speaker 4: It's based on really significant concrete advancements in our ability
Speaker 4: to watch the sky. Specifically these new astronomical facilities like
Speaker 4: the National Science Foundation's Viera Ruben Observatory. That's a game changer.
Speaker 2: How so what makes Vera Rubin different?
Speaker 4: Well, the ver Ruben Observatory is designed for this massive
Speaker 4: project called the Legacy Survey of Space and Time or LSST.
Speaker 4: It's not just another telescope. It's got this huge eight
Speaker 4: point four meter mirror, but crucially an incredibly wide field
Speaker 4: of view. It can image the entire visible sky from
Speaker 4: its location every few nights. Is design lets it scan
Speaker 4: enormous swaths of the sky with unprecedented speed and sensitivity.
Speaker 4: It can spot faint things, fast moving things that would
Speaker 4: have been totally invisible to older telescopes. It's essentially like
Speaker 4: a giant cosmic sweep net way more efficient than anything
Speaker 4: we've had before. So as these capabilities expand, as Vera,
Speaker 4: Reubin and potentially other new surveys come fully online and
Speaker 4: hit their stride, our ability to spot these cosmic messengers
Speaker 4: is going to increase traumatically, almost exponentially. Maybe we are truly,
Speaker 4: truly just seeing the tip of the iceberg right now.
Speaker 4: An explosion of new data, new detections, new insights, it's
Speaker 4: just around the corner. It's an incredibly exciting time to
Speaker 4: be studying the skies. Honestly.
Speaker 2: Okay, so the thrill of discovery is definitely there. It's palpable.
Speaker 2: But let's get down to brastas beyond the sheer novelty.
Speaker 2: You know, wow, something from another star. Why are these
Speaker 2: objects such a big deal for science? Why should we
Speaker 2: the listener really care about a rock or an ice
Speaker 2: ball from light years away.
Speaker 4: That's a really excellent and critical question, And the answer is, well,
Speaker 4: it's actually quite simple, but incredibly far reaching. These objects
Speaker 4: represent our first ever direct opportunity to explore matter from
Speaker 4: beyond our own sun. Doctor Allan Stern, a highly respected
Speaker 4: planetary scientist who let a major study on this, put
Speaker 4: it perfectly. He said, these objects offer humankind the first
Speaker 4: feasible opportunity to closely explore bodies formed in other star systems.
Speaker 2: Explore, not just observe. That sounds key, exactly.
Speaker 4: Notice that word explore. This isn't just about looking at
Speaker 4: a faint speck of light or even taking a picture
Speaker 4: for millions of miles away. It's about the potential to
Speaker 4: get up close to collect detailed data, maybe even someday
Speaker 4: sample materials that originated in a completely different stellar nursery,
Speaker 4: forged in the fires of another star's berth, you know.
Speaker 4: To really get the value, imagine trying to understand, say,
Speaker 4: Martian geology, without ever sending a probe or a rover.
Speaker 4: Incredibly hard, right, mostly guesswork based on light analysis. Now
Speaker 4: take that idea further, Imagine getting actual geological samples, not
Speaker 4: just from Mars, but from a planet that formed around
Speaker 4: a different star light years away. That's the kind of
Speaker 4: value these interstellar objects represent. They're literally pieces of other
Speaker 4: star systems delivered right to our cosmic doorstep, free of charge.
Speaker 4: By studying them up close, we can start to tackle
Speaker 4: truly fundamental questions like are the building blocks of planets
Speaker 4: the same everywhere? Do the same physical laws and processes
Speaker 4: that shape our Solar system operate similarly across countless other
Speaker 4: stellar environments, or are the key differences? These are the
Speaker 4: kinds of grand, overarching questions these objects can help us answer.
Speaker 4: They're like Rosetta stones for understanding how planets form across
Speaker 4: the entire galaxy.
Speaker 2: Okay, so if we did manage to send a spacecraft
Speaker 2: to one, say on a flyby mission like we'll discuss later,
Speaker 2: what specific questions would scientists be itching to answer? What
Speaker 2: data are they really hungry for? What are the top
Speaker 2: priorities Given you might only have a short encounter, A.
Speaker 4: Mission like that would have very precise, groundbreaking scientific objectives,
Speaker 4: tailors specifically for what you can realistically gather in a
Speaker 4: fast flyby. For instance, one of the absolute primary goals
Speaker 4: would be to determine the detailed physical properties of the
Speaker 4: body itself. And that's not just about its overall size,
Speaker 4: which we can kind of estimate from Earth. We'd want
Speaker 4: to know its precise shape, is it lumpy, smooth, elongated
Speaker 4: like a mua. We'd want its density measured much more accurately,
Speaker 4: its rotation rate, how fast is its spinning, the detailed
Speaker 4: topography of its surface, are their craters, cliffs, planes, maybe
Speaker 4: even try to infer something about its internal structure if possible,
Speaker 4: perhaps from how it rotates or its gravitational influence on
Speaker 4: the spacecraft. However, slight all these characteristics, they offer direct
Speaker 4: invaluable insights into its formation environment.
Speaker 2: How so, what can shape or density tell us well?
Speaker 4: For example, was it formed in a really dense, chaotic
Speaker 4: nebula where collisions were frequent that might lead to an irregular,
Speaker 4: fragmented shape, or did it form in a quieter region
Speaker 4: allowing it to grow more spherically. Its density can tell
Speaker 4: us about its bulk composition is mostly rock, mostly ice
Speaker 4: a mix, and its journey through interstellar space exposed to
Speaker 4: radiation micrometeoroids, extreme cold for maybe billions of years that
Speaker 4: would also leave its mark. It tells us about erosion rates,
Speaker 4: how materials age out there in the void. This data
Speaker 4: would essentially be a direct window into the life story
Speaker 4: of an object from another star, a kind of cosmic biography.
Speaker 4: Then another absolutely crucial objective examining the ISC's composition in detail.
Speaker 4: This means meticulously analyzing the elements, the isotopes, the molecules
Speaker 4: present in its bulk material and especially in any gas
Speaker 4: or dust it might be releasing. We'd be looking for
Speaker 4: specific atomic ratios, the presence of certain organic compounds maybe,
Speaker 4: or even exotic materials we don't typically see in our
Speaker 4: own Solar System commets and asteroids. Understanding this chemical makeup
Speaker 4: could help explain its origins. What ingredients were available in
Speaker 4: its birthplace? Are they similar to what we find here
Speaker 4: adjusting maybe planetary ingredients are universal, or are there exotic
Speaker 4: materials that point to a vastly different stellar environment, perhaps
Speaker 4: one with a unique mix of heavy elements or different
Speaker 4: temperatures during formation.
Speaker 2: So like a chemical fingerprint of its home.
Speaker 4: System exactly a fingerprint. And furthermore, studying in the composition
Speaker 4: helps us understand how evolutionary forces like getting zapped by
Speaker 4: cosmic rays for eons, or bumping into interstellar dust or
Speaker 4: just the extreme cold might have affected the commets since
Speaker 4: it formed. Did it keep its original composition locked deep
Speaker 4: inside or has its surface been significantly altered over its
Speaker 4: long journey. Distinguishing between original conditions and later changes is critical.
Speaker 4: It helps us peel back the layers of time and
Speaker 4: travel to see its true birth signature. And then, thirdly,
Speaker 4: we'd be incredibly keen on investigating the nature of the
Speaker 4: object's coma. If it has one, like borisofted.
Speaker 2: The coma that's the fuzzy atmosphere.
Speaker 4: That's right for commets. The coma is that escaping atmosphere
Speaker 4: of gas and dust that appears what it gets close
Speaker 4: enough to a start a warm up. The heat makes
Speaker 4: trapped ices turned directly into gas, sublimating and dragging dust
Speaker 4: along with them. Analyzing the composition of this material, the
Speaker 4: specific gases, the types of dust particles being blown off,
Speaker 4: reveals what volatile materials are locked deep inside the object's core.
Speaker 4: These volatiles, they act like a time castle. They give
Speaker 4: us crucial clues about the temperatures and pressures back in
Speaker 4: its birthplace. Was it formed way out of the cold
Speaker 4: fringes of its star system, preserving really volatile ices like
Speaker 4: carbon monoxide or methane, or maybe closer in where would
Speaker 4: have different, perhaps less volatile materials. The coma is essentially
Speaker 4: the comet breathing out its history. Each exhale tells us
Speaker 4: a story about its distant home, hinting at the thermal
Speaker 4: history of its birth system. It's a way to directly
Speaker 4: sample its deep interior without actually having to land and dig.
Speaker 2: It's truly fascinating how these really specific goals, like analyzing
Speaker 2: gas in a coma can open up such huge questions
Speaker 2: about the whole universe. It's clearly not just about studying
Speaker 2: one random object, is it exactly.
Speaker 4: It's all about connecting those dots, seeing the bigger picture.
Speaker 4: All these individual objectives, understanding the physical properties, the composition
Speaker 4: the coma, they all converge on one overarching goal to
Speaker 4: significantly expand our understanding of how solid bodies planets, asteroids, comets,
Speaker 4: how they form in other star systems, and ultimately, of course,
Speaker 4: that helps us understand our own place in the cosmos
Speaker 4: a little better too. For so long, I mean, think
Speaker 4: about it, our models of how planets and smaller bodies
Speaker 4: form have been based almost entirely on what we see
Speaker 4: right here in our own solar system. We basically had
Speaker 4: a sample size of one.
Speaker 2: That's a good point. Like trying to understand all mammals
Speaker 2: just by studying I don't know a dog precisely.
Speaker 4: It's like trying to understand the incredible diversity of life
Speaker 4: on Earth by only ever studying one species of bird
Speaker 4: or one type of tree. You get a very limited
Speaker 4: picture data from an interstellar comet completely changes that game.
Speaker 4: It allows us to do something called comparative planetology, which
Speaker 4: is basically studying how different planets and smaller bodies form
Speaker 4: and evolve by comparing them. We'd be doing it on
Speaker 4: an interstellar scale, comparing a body from another star system
Speaker 4: directly to objects right here in our own backyard. Consider this,
Speaker 4: What if we found an isc it was really rich
Speaker 4: in a specific isotope, say of oxygen, that's super rare
Speaker 4: in our solar system. That could imply that the nebulae
Speaker 4: from which stars like our Sun form aren't as well
Speaker 4: mixed or homogeneous as we thought. It could tweak our
Speaker 4: fundamental models of how elements are created in stars and
Speaker 4: spread through the galaxy. Or maybe what if we detected
Speaker 4: complex prebiotic organic molecules to building blocks of life in abundance,
Speaker 4: but in significantly different types of ratios than we see
Speaker 4: in our own comments. That could dramatically shift our understanding
Speaker 4: of where life's ingredients come from across the galaxy. How
Speaker 4: common are they, how diverse are the recipes? These objects
Speaker 4: aren't just telling us about their home system, They're holding
Speaker 4: up a mirror to ours. They challenge our existing models,
Speaker 4: our assumptions about how our own solar system formed. They'll
Speaker 4: either confirm them as universal principles or show as entirely
Speaker 4: new ways that cosmic construction can happen. Roddens our perspective
Speaker 4: immensely on how common or how diverse planetarret systems truly
Speaker 4: are out there. Okay, the scientific potential is undeniable. It's frankly,
Speaker 4: absolutely thrilling to think about. But it also sounds like
Speaker 4: a massive logistical nightmare. You said, these things aren't just
Speaker 4: passing through, They're screaming past us at incredible speeds. Beyond
Speaker 4: just the raw velocity, What are the biggest headaches.
Speaker 2: For mission planners? What keeps them up at night when
Speaker 2: they even think about trying to catch one of these
Speaker 2: cosmic bullets.
Speaker 4: You've absolutely hit on the core problem. The speed is
Speaker 4: one massive factor, yes, but it's compounded by their trajectories,
Speaker 4: what we call hyperbolic trajectories. Unlike our own solar systems
Speaker 4: comets and asteroids, which are gravitationally down to the Sun
Speaker 4: and follow elliptical pass coming back again and again, these
Speaker 4: interstellar objects they're just here for a single fleeting visit.
Speaker 4: They come in from interstellar space. They whip around the
Speaker 4: Sun once using its gravity like as slang shot basically,
Speaker 4: and then boom they're gone back out into the interstellar void,
Speaker 4: never to return.
Speaker 2: So no second chances, no leisurely rendezvous.
Speaker 4: None whatsoever. We get one shot, and that window of
Speaker 4: opportunity is incredibly narrow, often just weeks or maybe months
Speaker 4: in the moment we detect it until it's simply too
Speaker 4: far away and moving too fast to even contemplate reaching
Speaker 4: trying to match their speed for an extended study, like
Speaker 4: going into orbit around one with their current propulsion technology,
Speaker 4: it's just well, it's simply not feasible. The amount of
Speaker 4: fuel you need for that kind of massive deceleration and
Speaker 4: then orbital insertion would be absolutely astronomical, far beyond what
Speaker 4: any current rocket could carry on any realistic budget could sustain.
Speaker 4: It really is like trying to get i don't know,
Speaker 4: a delivery truck to somehow chase down and then start
Speaker 4: circling a supersonic jet that's only going to fly through
Speaker 4: your local airspace one single time. It's just not going
Speaker 4: to happen with today's tech, and this creates enormous logistical
Speaker 4: herbals for anyone trying to design a mission. You're talking
Speaker 4: about an almost impossibly short observation window for telescopes on
Speaker 4: Earth to even spot the object in the first place,
Speaker 4: then calculate its trajectory, acculate enough, and then plan and
Speaker 4: launch an intercept mission. Then the spacecraft itself would need
Speaker 4: immense propulsive power just for the launch and any necessary
Speaker 4: course corrections midflight, which, as I said, is largely beyond
Speaker 4: our current capabilities. If the goal is an orbital rendez prouve,
Speaker 4: the need for immediate precise action once a target is
Speaker 4: identified is just paramount. You can't ditter, you can't wait
Speaker 4: around for the next launch window. The target is already
Speaker 4: moving away at this incredible clip. It dictates a very fleeting,
Speaker 4: very fast encounter, making those traditional long duration orbital missions
Speaker 4: simply impossible for these kinds of targets right now.
Speaker 2: Wow, a supersonic jet and a one time pass only
Speaker 2: that really does sound almost insurmountable. So if orbiting them
Speaker 2: is out, if we can't chase them, and the way
Speaker 2: we normally think about space missions, what hope does this
Speaker 2: SRI concept offer? How do you even begin to approach
Speaker 2: such an elusive, fast moving target. This is where it
Speaker 2: gets really interesting.
Speaker 4: I guess this is indeed where the ingenuity of space
Speaker 4: engineers really comes into play, where you take what looks
Speaker 4: impossible and find a clever workaround, often by shifting your
Speaker 4: perspective on the problem. Southwest Research Institute or SRORI, they
Speaker 4: have this internally funded project where they've completed a really
Speaker 4: detailed mission study, and this study specifically lays out how
Speaker 4: a proposed spacecraft could successfully achieve a flyby with an
Speaker 4: interstellar comic. The absolute key here is the phrase flyby reconnaissance.
Speaker 4: We're not talking about orbiting, We're talking about a high speed,
Speaker 4: close range pass. Their rigorous studies showed pretty convincingly actually
Speaker 4: that such a flyby is not only feasible from an
Speaker 4: engineering standpoint, but also remarkably affordable, especially when you weigh
Speaker 4: it against the immense potential scientific return.
Speaker 2: Affordable is good. So what does a flyby actually entail
Speaker 2: in this context? Well, fundamentally, a flyby means the spacecraft
Speaker 2: passes the target at an extremely high relative velocity. It
Speaker 2: doesn't try to slow down and match speeds. Instead, it
Speaker 2: gathers as much data as physically possible in a very
Speaker 2: short window thing minutes maybe even second, not months, as
Speaker 2: it zips past the object at close range. Matthew Freeman,
Speaker 2: who's a project manager for this study SBORI, he clarified
Speaker 2: their specific proposed approach. He said the proposed mission would
Speaker 2: be a high speed head on flyby head on. That
Speaker 2: sounds counterintuitive, like flying into the cosmic bullet.
Speaker 4: It does sound a bit like that, doesn't it, But
Speaker 4: it's actually advantageous for certain types of scientific instruments. A
Speaker 4: head on approach or something close to it maximizes the
Speaker 4: relative velocity between the spacecraft and the combats material, especially
Speaker 4: any coma. This high relative speed can be really beneficial
Speaker 4: for instruments like mass spectrometers, which basically need to scoop
Speaker 4: up particles as they fly through them. Higher speed can
Speaker 4: mean more particles collected in a short time. It's also
Speaker 4: be useful for certain imaging techniques that can leverage that
Speaker 4: rapid pass to build up data quickly or get specific
Speaker 4: viewing angles. And importantly, this isn't just some back of
Speaker 4: the envelope sketch. It's a rigorously designed mission concept built
Speaker 4: on solid engineering principles and detailed scientific requirements. The fact
Speaker 4: that SCRI notes it could be later proposed to NASA
Speaker 4: really highlights that it has serious scientific and engineering backing.
Speaker 4: It makes it a pragmatic, achievable solution to what initially
Speaker 4: looked like an almost insurmountable problem. It changes the game
Speaker 4: from can't orbit to can fly by?
Speaker 2: Okay, So to pull off something that challenging, a high
Speaker 2: speed maybe head on fly by, you'd need an incredibly
Speaker 2: specific spacecraft design, wouldn't you. This isn't just sending any
Speaker 2: probe up there, it's engineering something to perform this incredibly
Speaker 2: complex high speed maneuver with maybe only minutes to get
Speaker 2: the crucial data. What were the key elements SRI had
Speaker 2: to focus on in their study, particularly thinking about the
Speaker 2: design and crucially what the spacecraft would need to carry,
Speaker 2: what instruments?
Speaker 4: You're absolutely right, this is definitely not a mission where
Speaker 4: you can just repurpose an old design. It requires bespoke engineering.
Speaker 4: The SRI led internal Research study specifically tackled those unique
Speaker 4: design challenges you mentioned, the ones inherent to an ISIC
Speaker 4: interstep mission. They had to consider everything really from the
Speaker 4: propulsion systems needed to get the spacecraft on the right
Speaker 4: trajectory quickly to the incredibly precise navigation required to hit
Speaker 4: a relatively small, fast moving target that's basically appearing out
Speaker 4: of deep space with maybe not much warning. They had
Speaker 4: to account for those extreme velocities not just of the target,
Speaker 4: but also of the spacecraft itself during the encounter, and
Speaker 4: of course that very short window available for detecting the object,
Speaker 4: launching the mission, and performing the actual intercept in science gathering. Crucially,
Speaker 4: their study also meticulously defined the likely costs and the
Speaker 4: payload needs for such a mission. Now, while this specific
Speaker 4: list of instruments isn't detailed in the public information from
Speaker 4: their study, we can infer quite a bit the payload
Speaker 4: would have to be very carefully chosen, highly specialized to
Speaker 4: meet those core scientific objectives composition physical properties COMA analysis
Speaker 4: within the severe constraints of a fast flyby.
Speaker 2: So instruments that work really, really fast.
Speaker 4: Exactly think compact, highly s sensitive mass spectrometers to quickly
Speaker 4: analyze the composition of any gas and dust in the
Speaker 4: coma as you fly through it. High resolution imagers with
Speaker 4: incredibly fast shutter speeds to capture detailed pictures of the
Speaker 4: surface topography during that fleeting pass. Maybe dust particle impact
Speaker 4: detectors to measure the size and frequency of duft grains.
Speaker 4: Everything has to be designed to acquire a lot of
Speaker 4: data very accurately, and potentially just minutes or even seconds
Speaker 4: of close approach. It's a very delicate balancing act between
Speaker 4: scientific ambition and engineering practicality, ensuring every single ounce of
Speaker 4: payload delivers the maximum possible scientific return in that short encountertime.
Speaker 4: And what's also really important here is that they mentioned
Speaker 4: the mission concept was developed based on previous interstellar objects
Speaker 4: ISO detections. That means the lessons learned from puzzling over
Speaker 4: Uma Mua and from observing the more conventional to Iborisov
Speaker 4: directly inform their design choices. They could anticipate potential challenges
Speaker 4: like maybe needing instruments sensitive to unusual compositions or shapes,
Speaker 4: and optimize the instruments selection based on what we've already seen.
Speaker 4: They weren't starting totally blind. They were building intelligently on
Speaker 4: the knowledge gained from those first unexpected visitors.
Speaker 2: Okay, designing a mission in theory, running simulations, that's one thing,
Speaker 2: it sounds incredibly thorough, But how do you know it
Speaker 2: would actually work out there and the chaotic, unpredictable reality
Speaker 2: of space. How did the recent discovery of three i
Speaker 2: at lists provide that crucial real world test case for
Speaker 2: Sarah I's whole concept.
Speaker 3: Right.
Speaker 4: This is where three ILISS becomes so much more than
Speaker 4: just the third interesting discovery. It really acted as a
Speaker 4: validating force, a critical real world proof of concept for
Speaker 4: the entire mission design see the team. It's why I
Speaker 4: didn't just design this theoretical mission and then put the
Speaker 4: report on a shelf. As soon as three ils was
Speaker 4: discovered and as trajectory was calculated, they immediately used it
Speaker 4: as a real world test case. They effectively validated their
Speaker 4: whole mission concept by determining after the fact that three
Speaker 4: ilists could have been intercepted and observed by their proposed
Speaker 4: spacecraft had it been ready in waiting.
Speaker 2: So they ran the numbers for Antola specifically exactly.
Speaker 4: This wasn't just a hypothetical, well, if we built this spacecraft,
Speaker 4: it might work for some future object. It was a
Speaker 4: concrete demonstration if we had built it, it could have
Speaker 4: worked for this specific real world object that just flew past.
Speaker 4: And that transition from theoretical possibility to demonstrable feasibility against
Speaker 4: a real target that's huge. This validation is just incredibly
Speaker 4: significant for the project. It meant that the actual trajectory
Speaker 4: of three iyautlists was found to be well within the
Speaker 4: interceptible range of the mission soier I had designed. That's
Speaker 4: absolutely key. If Atlice had been moving, say, significantly faster,
Speaker 4: or its path was just too far off or even
Speaker 4: ahead on fly by using existing propulsion capabilities, then the
Speaker 4: whole concept might have been proven unfeasible or at least
Speaker 4: much harder. But with three ioutlists, the calculation showed that
Speaker 4: this kind of cosmic chase, this precise high speed interception,
Speaker 4: is genuinely within our technological reach. Matthew Freeman, the project manager,
Speaker 4: enforce this. He emphasized again that the scientific observations made
Speaker 4: during such a flyby would be groundbreaking. It highlights the
Speaker 4: immense value of proving that such an encounter isn't just
Speaker 4: a scientific pipe dream, it's actually possible. It effectively gives
Speaker 4: a green light saying yes, this mission design can hit
Speaker 4: a real target like the one we just saw.
Speaker 2: Okay, but how do you even begin to map out
Speaker 2: a path to intercept something like that, something moving so erratical,
Speaker 2: well maybe not erratically, but certainly very fast coming from
Speaker 2: light years away, especially if you might only have weeks,
Speaker 2: maybe months of warning. What kind of I don't know,
Speaker 2: cosmic navigation system did Solar I have to develop. It
Speaker 2: still sounds like trying to hit a moving target from
Speaker 2: another planet with a dart.
Speaker 4: That's a great analogy, and it really does underscore the
Speaker 4: immense computational challenge the orbital mechanics involved. It's definitely not trivial.
Speaker 4: Celular I didn't just sit around waiting for an isic
Speaker 4: to pop up and then frantically try to calculate a
Speaker 4: trajectory from scratch. They took a much more proactive and
Speaker 4: frankly innovative approach. Actually developed custom software specifically designed to
Speaker 4: generate a representative synthetic population of isics.
Speaker 2: Synthetic meaning like fake comets.
Speaker 4: Sort of, yeah, hypothetical ones. They created thousands, maybe even millions,
Speaker 4: of simulated interstellar comets in their computer models, each with
Speaker 4: slightly different trajectories, different velocities, different points of entry into
Speaker 4: our Solar system, all based on our best astrophysical models
Speaker 4: of how star systems might inject material Like this. The
Speaker 4: power of doing this kind of large scale simulation is immense.
Speaker 4: It allows them to predict and plan for a vast
Speaker 4: range of possible scenarios before an object even appears. It
Speaker 4: helps make their mission design robust, more likely to work,
Speaker 4: regardless of exactly what an incoming IOC looks like or
Speaker 4: precisely where it comes from. It's like creating a cosmic
Speaker 4: playbook that has a strategy ready for almost any possible
Speaker 4: incoming play Then, using this sophisticated software, they capulated what's
Speaker 4: called a minimum energy trajectory from Earth to the path
Speaker 4: of each of these simulated comets in their synthetic population.
Speaker 2: Minimum energy. That sounds important for space travel less fuel.
Speaker 4: Exactly, the concept of minimum energy is absolutely critical in
Speaker 4: space mission design. It translates directly to needing less fuel,
Speaker 4: which means lower launch masks, lower costs, and ultimately a
Speaker 4: much more feasible mission. Instead of just trying to brute
Speaker 4: force your way there with massive engine burns, minimum energy
Speaker 4: trajectories find the most efficient path. They often use clever
Speaker 4: gravitational assists, maybe swinging by the Sun or even Jupiter
Speaker 4: to get a slingshot effect, reaching the target with the
Speaker 4: least possible expenditure of precious propellant. It's like a sailor
Speaker 4: skillfully using the currents and winds instead of just running
Speaker 4: the engine full blast the whole way and then santurized
Speaker 4: orbital mechanics expert doctor Mark Tapley used this very same software,
Speaker 4: this powerful tool they had built, to calculate the precise
Speaker 4: trajectory that their proposed spacecraft could have taken from Earth
Speaker 4: to intercept the real three iaalis after it was discovered,
Speaker 4: and the findings from that specific calculation they were very encouraging,
Speaker 4: almost surprisingly so. Actually, they discovered that a low energy
Speaker 4: rendezvous trajectory, well not rendezvous, a low energy intercept trajectory
Speaker 4: is indeed possible for targets like three I Atlas. And
Speaker 4: get this, in many cases, such a trajectory would require
Speaker 4: less launch energy and less inflight velocity change delta V
Speaker 4: as engineers call it, than many other Solar System missions
Speaker 4: we've already flown. Like this is the outer planets, for.
Speaker 2: Instance, really easier than going to Jupiter or Saturn in
Speaker 2: some ways in.
Speaker 4: Terms of the required change in velocity after launch. Yes,
Speaker 4: potentially that's a significant breakthrough because it fundamentally suggests that
Speaker 4: chasing these cosmic bullets might not be as prohibitively expensive
Speaker 4: or as technologically demanding as you might instinctively think it
Speaker 4: transforms the mission idea from a potential technological fantasy into
Speaker 4: a surprisingly practical, potentially affordable endeavor. It shows we have
Speaker 4: the computational tools and the deep orbital understanding needed to
Speaker 4: actually plot workable course.
Speaker 2: That is astonishing to think we have the software smart
Speaker 2: enough to map these paths, and the math says it
Speaker 2: might even be more feasible than some missions we've already
Speaker 2: pulled off. So what does all this mean for our
Speaker 2: actual current technological readiness? Are we basically ready to go?
Speaker 2: Could we launch something like this tomorrow if an object
Speaker 2: showed up? Are we ready to chase these cosmic bullets
Speaker 2: and unlock their secrets right now?
Speaker 4: Well tomorrow might be a slight stretch, but the short
Speaker 4: answer is largely yes, we are technologically ready, Doctor Mark Tapley.
Speaker 4: Stevement on this point is incredibly powerful and really reassuring,
Speaker 4: he said, and I'm quoting loosely here. The very encouraging
Speaker 4: thing about three Atlas peering is that it really strengthens
Speaker 4: the case our study made. We demonstrated that it doesn't
Speaker 4: take anything harder than the technologies and launch performance like
Speaker 4: missions that NASA has already flown.
Speaker 2: Wow, so no magic new engines needed, no unobtainium exactly.
Speaker 4: That's a monumental declaration. Really. It means we don't need exotic,
Speaker 4: unproven technologies. We don't need propulsion systems that only exist
Speaker 4: in science fiction novels, or spacecraft materials that haven't been
Speaker 4: invented yet. We already have the proven capabilities, the robust
Speaker 4: rockets needed for launch, the sophisticated navigation techniques needed for
Speaker 4: deep space intercepts. These are things NASA and other space
Speaker 4: agencies have successfully used time and time again for missions
Speaker 4: throughout our own Solar system. Think about missions like new
Speaker 4: Horizons which perform the incredible high speed flyby of Pluto
Speaker 4: and aercoth, or various comet and asteroid flyby missions we've
Speaker 4: conducted over the decades, The foundational technologies, the engineering know
Speaker 4: how for this kind of interstellar intercept, it's already in
Speaker 4: our toolkit. We've done things like this before, just not
Speaker 4: quite for an interstellar target yet. And this technological feasibility
Speaker 4: it isn't just about one specific mission potentially targeting something
Speaker 4: like three iatmos was a successful mission to an isic,
Speaker 4: especially one design using all the insights gained from three
Speaker 4: ilists in the sari Ara study could also serve as
Speaker 4: a vital foundational model, a template, if you will, for
Speaker 4: future missions to other iics as they're inevitably discovered. It
Speaker 4: helps develop a reusable, validated strategy for exploring this entire,
Speaker 4: newly recognized class of celestial bodies. It's not just about
Speaker 4: bagging one trophy. It's about opening up a whole new
Speaker 4: frontier of interstellar exploration that can be repeatedly accessed, refined,
Speaker 4: and expanded upon as more and more of these cosmic
Speaker 4: messengers are detected by telescopes like Vera Rubin. It truly
Speaker 4: feels like a gateway mission, potentially opening the door to
Speaker 4: a whole new era of understanding the cosmos beyond our
Speaker 4: immediate stellar neighborhood.
Speaker 2: What stands out most to you about this whole idea
Speaker 2: the fact that we apparently already have the capabilities for
Speaker 2: something so scientifically ambitious, something that honestly, just a few
Speaker 2: years ago sounded like pure unadulterated science fiction. It really
Speaker 2: does feel like we're standing right on the cusp of
Speaker 2: a brand new era of cosmic exploration, doesn't it. Well,
Speaker 2: we've certainly journeyed through some amazing territory today from the
Speaker 2: astounding discoveries of these interstellar objects, digging into the profound
Speaker 2: scientific questions they force us to ask about the universe
Speaker 2: and exploring this brilliant and apparently practical mission concept that
Speaker 2: promises to deliver some real answers. From Umumu's completely surprising
Speaker 2: appearance to the crucial dalidation that three Ilo has provided,
Speaker 2: just an extraordinary time for space science. Isn't it full
Speaker 2: of truly unprecedented potential?
Speaker 4: Well, absolutely, the ability even just the potential ability to
Speaker 4: intercept and study up close material that originated entirely beyond
Speaker 4: our own stellar neighborhood. I mean, it opens up genuinely
Speaker 4: unprecedented avenues for understanding how planets form, how entire star
Speaker 4: systems evolve, not just here but across the galaxy. It
Speaker 4: pushes the boundaries of what we can learn about our
Speaker 4: own cosmic origins. It gives us actual tangible samples potentially
Speaker 4: of the cosmic diaspora, providing real empirical data to test
Speaker 4: our grandest theories about the universe.
Speaker 2: It's incredibly exciting and all this it really raises an
Speaker 2: important final question, something for you, our listener, to maybe
Speaker 2: ponder as you reflect on these incredible cosmic messengers. If
Speaker 2: these interstellar comments really are messengers from Afar, carrying these
Speaker 2: stories from their distant, perhaps utterly alien home systems, what
Speaker 2: kind of message might we actually find etched into their
Speaker 2: very atoms? What fundamental truths about the universe might they
Speaker 2: be carying, just waiting for us to finally decipher them,
Speaker 2: Truths that can entirely reshape how we view our own
Speaker 2: cosmic backyard. What would you hope to learn from such
Speaker 2: an encounter, Maybe about how common life's building blocks really are,
Speaker 2: or about the sheer diversity of planetary systems out there,
Speaker 2: or perhaps perhaps even a hint of something more profoundly unexpected,
Speaker 2: something we haven't even conceived of yet. What secrets do
Speaker 2: you think these travelers holds before