Speaker 1: Okay, let's dive in. We're looking at something, well, something
really unusual happening in our solar system.
Speaker 2: Right now, that's putting it mildly. It feels like we've
moved past the predictable clockwork universe we thought.
Speaker 1: We knew, right, It's more like, I don't know. The
Cosmos is throwing curveballs at us objects, defying the basic
rules we expect them to follow.
Speaker 2: Especially when they get close to the Sun. We're seeing
celestial bodies that are getting absolutely blasted by solar heat
and radiation, intense, heat, immense and yet they're just refusing
to act like normal comets or asteroids. It's fundamentally puzzling.
Speaker 1: That's exactly the mystery we want to unpack today. In
this deep dive. We've got source material pointing to two
very specific visitors causing a stir.
Speaker 2: The infamous three I Atlas, the interstellar object that just
keeps surprising.
Speaker 1: Everyone, and now a newcomer see twenty twenty five V
one borisof also incredibly strange, also defying expectations.
Speaker 2: And the mission for us really is to connect the dots.
For you listening, what are the key anomalies here? What's
weird about their materials supposedly, and.
Speaker 1: This alignment, the way they're positioned relative to us and
each other, it seems statistically.
Speaker 2: Quite improbable, extremely and we have to figure out how
this ties into what's happening with the Sun right now,
because it's incredibly active.
Speaker 1: Which leads to space weather, geomagnetic storms hitting Earth exactly.
Speaker 2: It's all connected. This isn't just abstract astronomy. It has
real world implications. It's a high scakes observation period, no doubt.
Speaker 1: So setting the scene V one Borius off really grabs
your attention immediately. It's new, its orbit is unusual. They're
calling it a rogue object for now.
Speaker 2: And it just pops up seemingly out of nowhere in
this incredibly strategic spot right.
Speaker 1: Between the three eye atlasts and Earth. It's almost too neat.
Speaker 2: It raises the eyebrows definitely. And the biggest thing, just
like Atlas, pulmonary observation suggests it doesn't have a proper.
Speaker 1: Tail, which for something classified as a comet, getting close
to the Sun is the fundamental test. It seems to
be failing. It forces you to ask, what are we
actually looking at here.
Speaker 2: At you know, it adds a layer of intrigue that
the discoverer is Gannati Boresov, the.
Speaker 1: Same astronomer who found two I Borisov, the second interstellar
object confirmed.
Speaker 2: Yes, his name being attached gives it immediate weight in
the astronomical community. This isn't just a random blip. It's
a finding from a very skilled observer that directly challenges
our assumptions.
Speaker 1: Okay, so let's dig into this new intruder. First, C
twenty twenty five V one Borisov.
Speaker 2: Right before it got the official comet designation C twenty
twenty five V one Borisov, it had a temporary label
GB zero zero zero zero zero eight.
Speaker 1: One zero, which is pretty standard right for researchers compiling
initial data before it's formally classified exactly, But.
Speaker 2: The C designation is key. It means astronomers looked at
its orbit an initial appearance and said, okay, this looks
like a comet.
Speaker 1: Which sets up an expectation. Comets have ice, they get
near the sun, they sublimate, they form tails.
Speaker 2: That's the textbook definition. But V one Borisov isn't following
the textbook. Its behavior is startling.
Speaker 1: Starting with where it was found. You mentioned this strategic positioning.
Speaker 2: It's quite dramatic. Actually, when it was discovered, its position
in the sky placed it almost perfectly on a line
between Three Eye Atlas and Earth.
Speaker 1: So if you were looking out from Earth towards Atlas
V one Borisov was right there in the foreground.
Speaker 2: Essentially precisely, imagine drawing a line through those three points
Earth v One Borisov, Atlas. It's a very provocative geometric
setup right off the bat and.
Speaker 1: It's not just hanging out way out there. Its path
is taking it deep into the inner solar.
Speaker 2: System, incredibly deep aggressive. As you said, its trajectory brings
it closer to the Sun than three Eye Atlas ever.
Speaker 1: Got closer than Atlas, so well inside Venus' orbit.
Speaker 2: Yes, significantly inside Venus' orbit. That's crucial context. Think about
the environmental stress that puts on an object, the.
Speaker 1: Heat, the radiation pressure.
Speaker 2: It must be immense off the charts, and its closest approach,
the perihelium, is coming up very soon mid November. The
current estimate is around.
Speaker 1: The sixteenth Okay, so mid November it's going to get
its absolute maximum dose of solar energy.
Speaker 2: And for anything classified as a comet, that should be showtime.
We should be seeing dramatic physical changes, a big, bright.
Speaker 1: Tail, But that brings us squarely to the main anomaly,
the missing tail. It's just not there, is it.
Speaker 2: Well, it's complicated, but the consensus is leaning heavily towards
no obvious tail. It does have a coma, right.
Speaker 1: Let's clarify that difference for people. The coma isn't the.
Speaker 2: Tail, correct. The coma is the fuzzy cloud, the atmosphere
of gas and dust right around the solid nucleus. Think
of it as the immediate boil off. Observations put V
one Borisov's coma at about forty arc seconds across.
Speaker 1: Forty arcseconds, okay, And the tail, that long stream pointing
away from the sun.
Speaker 2: That's the missing piece. It seems to be almost non existent.
And the data we have.
Speaker 1: Is messy, messy, how like conflicting report, very conflicting.
Speaker 2: Our sources indicate that out of ten specific observations looking
for a tail, only two observers report or at seeing
anything that might qualify only.
Speaker 1: Two out of ten. That's already telling it is.
Speaker 2: And even those two positive reports don't agree with each
other at all. They're highly discrepant.
Speaker 1: How discrepant are we talking?
Speaker 2: Okay? Remember the koma size is around forty arc seconds, right,
that's the baseline fuzzball.
Speaker 1: Got it?
Speaker 2: One observer reported a potential tail length of fifty arc seconds.
The other reported seventy two arc seconds.
Speaker 1: Well, wait, seventy two compared to fifty when the coma
itself is only forty that's a massive disagreement.
Speaker 2: Huge and astronomical terms. A twenty two arc second difference
for such a faint feature is enormous, especially when you
consider eight other skilled observers, presumably using similar equipment around
the same time, saw absolutely nothing.
Speaker 1: So what does that discrepancy suggest. Maybe they saw a
brief temporary puff of something, or maybe instrument noise.
Speaker 2: It could be several things, a localized temporary outgassing event
that quickly dissipated, or perhaps differences in equipment sensitivity or
atmosphere conditions at the time above, or frankly, it could
be measurement instability or error.
Speaker 1: Forty arcseconds. Just for context, how big is that visually,
like compared to the moon or something.
Speaker 2: It's tiny from our perspective. Forty arc seconds is roughly
the apparent size of a large lunar crater viewed from Earth. Now,
imagine trying to measure a faint, wispy extension on something
that small, faint and moving fast against background stars.
Speaker 1: Okay, Yeah, So the disagreement between fifty and seventy two,
plus the fact most saw nothing strongly suggests there isn't
a persistent classic cometary tale.
Speaker 2: That's the leading conclusion. It seems V one Borisov just
doesn't have the significant amount of volatile material, the water ice,
the CO two ice that you need to create that
spectacular visible tail when sunlight hits.
Speaker 1: It, even though it's diving deep into the heat zone.
Speaker 2: Even then, which of course immediately makes us think of
the other.
Speaker 1: Object three I Atlasts, because that's been its whole story,
hasn't it? Resilience against the sun exactly?
Speaker 2: Atlas is the poster child for this kind of anomalous resilience.
It's the veteran here. It's already past its perihelium, its
closest point to the Sun.
Speaker 1: And it didn't just pass perihelion. It went through something
called superior conjunction around October twenty first. Right.
Speaker 2: Superior conjunction is when from our viewpoint on Earth, the
object goes behind.
Speaker 1: The sun, so it's basically getting hit with the full
force of the Sun's output from.
Speaker 2: The far side, maximum exposure, not just light, but the
solar wind, coronal mass ejections, particle radiation of the works.
It was positioned right in the firing line.
Speaker 1: If anything was going to finally make it break apart
or sublimate dramatically, that should have been the moment, the
ultimate stress test.
Speaker 2: You'd think. So if it had any significant amount of
typical cometary ice left that period should have triggered a
huge outburst, a massive visible tail. But defying expectations seems
to be what three ie atlis does best. Even after
that intense solar blasting during and after superior conjunction, it
is still not showing an obvious, large scale tail.
Speaker 1: It just keeps holding itself together. The enigma continues.
Speaker 2: It really does contains that same puzzling characteristic, remarkably resilient, essentially.
Speaker 1: Tail liss And it's not just about surviving, is it.
There's also this weirdness with its brightness.
Speaker 2: Ah, yes, the brightness paradox. This is fascinating. Based purely
on its orbit and distance, astronomers calculated what its apparent
magnitude how bright it should look to us should be,
and the prediction was the expected value was around magnitude
eleven point two, which is pretty faint, requires a decent telescope.
Speaker 1: Okay, but what are we actually seeing now?
Speaker 2: The latest observations put it at magnitude nine point eight.
Speaker 1: Nine point eight. Okay. Now for listeners, the magnitude scale
is backward right. Lower numbers mean brighter.
Speaker 2: Correct, and it's a logarithmic scale, which is key. A
difference of one point four magnitudes from eleven point two
down to nine point eight isn't a small change.
Speaker 1: How much brighter is that?
Speaker 2: In real terms, every whole magnitude difference corresponds to about
two point five to four times the brightness, So one
point four magnitudes means it's significantly brighter. You're looking at
something like maybe three point six times brighter than predicted
somewhere in that bulb power.
Speaker 1: So it's much brighter than it should be based on
just reflecting sunlight at its distance. What does that imply?
Is it shedding reflective material?
Speaker 2: That's the logical inference. It must be reflecting more sunlight,
which could mean its surface area has increased somehow, or
it's shedding fine reflective particles into a cloud around it,
increasing the overall reflected light.
Speaker 1: But if it's shedding material, shouldn't that create a tail.
Speaker 2: That's the contradiction, precisely the contradiction. We know it is
shedding some material because it's trajectory shows slight deviations what
we call non gravitational acceleration.
Speaker 1: Meaning forces other than the suns and planet's gravity are
acting on it, like tiny jets pushing it.
Speaker 2: Exactly, little puffs of gas or dust escaping are giving
it tiny nudges, altering its orbit slightly from what pure
gravity would dictate.
Speaker 1: And normally for a commet, that non gravitational force is
the direct result of ice turning to gas, creating the
jets that form the tail. It confirms mass loss, yes.
Speaker 2: But with Atlas we see the non gravitational nudges confirming
mass loss, yet we don't see the corresponding large visible tail.
Speaker 1: So the material coming off must be.
Speaker 2: Different, that's the strong implication. This leads us to clues
about its composition. The material being lost isn't volatile ized
that creates a big visible gas and fine dust plume.
Speaker 1: So what could it been said, rock dust, metal particles.
Speaker 2: That's the thinking. The inference is that the material being
ablated or stripped off by the solar environment is likely
much less volatile, things like rocky minerals, fine silicate dust,
possibly metallic particles, maybe even high concentrations of carbon in
some form.
Speaker 1: Okay, let's train analogy. A normal comet getting close to
the sun is like holding an ice cube over a flame.
It melts, it drips, its steams, very obvious change, very
visible mass loss.
Speaker 2: Good analogy. The water ice sublimates directly to gas, carrying
fine dust with it, creating that huge visible coma and
tail the steam.
Speaker 1: But Atlas is more like holding a chunk of rock
or metal over the same flame. It gets incredibly hot,
maybe some fine dust or vapor comes off, but the
core structure remains solid. The mass loss is less dramatic,
less visible.
Speaker 2: Exactly, It suggests the solar wind and radiation are eroding
or spattering tougher material off the surface rather than boiling ice.
This might release heavier particles like fine sand or metallic dust,
which don't expand into that huge diffuse cloud needed for
a long tail.
Speaker 1: They might stay closer to the nucleus or dissipate differently,
making them very hard to see from.
Speaker 2: Earth precisely so it stays intact. It gets brighter than expected,
maybe because the eroding surface is reflective or it's creating
a localized dust cloud, but it resists that explosive vaporization.
Speaker 1: Which points to an object that's either incredibly dense or
native materials much tougher than the icy snowballs we usually
find in the Ort cloud or Kuiper Belt.
Speaker 2: It strongly suggests a fundamentally different kind of composition for
an interstellar visitor. It challenges our models of what these
things are actually made of.
Speaker 1: And just to nail this down, have recent orbital checks
confirmed this resilience. Did the solar blasting significantly alter its path?
Speaker 2: Well, the latest orbital solutions, updated around November fifth, actually
showed its non gravitational acceleration was a bit less than
some earlier calculations suggested.
Speaker 1: Less so even less push from outgassing than previously thought.
Speaker 2: Yes, it confirms there's some slight mass loss happening, some
non gravitational effect, but it wasn't a major event that
dramatically shifted its orbit. It reinforces the idea that this
thing is tough. It's the ultimate cosmic survivor.
Speaker 1: It seems okay. So we have these two objects, three
I Atlas and V one boris Off, both showing this
remarkable resilience, both lacking the expected tail. That similarity alone is.
Speaker 2: Interesting, very interesting, But it becomes significantly more compelling when
you layer in the geometry where they are relative to
each other and to us.
Speaker 1: If these were just typical fragile comments behaving normally, maybe
their alignment wouldn't mean as much incidents.
Speaker 2: Right, But because they both share this highly unusual, tough characteristic,
their sequential appearance in this specific configuration, well, that makes
you pay attention.
Speaker 1: The odds start to stack up.
Speaker 2: You mean, you have to consider it. Look at the
sky right now, from Earth's perspective, three eye Atlas and
V one Borisov are visually very close.
Speaker 1: Together, almost conjunct, you said, like nearly overlapping in our
line of sight.
Speaker 2: Nearly. Yes, They are both currently appearing within the constellation Virgo,
very close neighbors in the night sky.
Speaker 1: And wasn't there a third unusual object nearby?
Speaker 2: Two yes, adding to the general strangeness of that patch
of sky see twenty twenty five K one Atlas another
comet discovered by the ATLA survey coincidentally it's nearby and
the constellation Leo, and that.
Speaker 1: One is unusual, but in a different way. It has
a weird tail.
Speaker 2: It does. It's noted for having a distinctly golden yellow
colored tail. The thinking there is it might be due
to higher amounts of sodium or maybe even vaporized iron
nickel metals in its dust. So also awe but odd
in a different way than our two tailless wonders.
Speaker 1: Okay, so K one Atlas highlights that the neighborhood is interesting,
but the main focus is the pair in Virgo three
I Atlas and V one Borisov.
Speaker 2: Definitely, and their alignment wasn't just visual proximity in the sky.
There was a point around November eighth, just a couple
of days after the main observation dates were drawing from,
where the three bodies were almost physically aligned in space.
Speaker 1: Earth V one Borisov and three Iyeatless in a near straight.
Speaker 2: Line very close to it. V one Borisov was positioned
slightly above the ecliptic plane, the main plane where planet's orbit,
but still remarkably close to that direct line connecting Earth
and three eyelis.
Speaker 1: Wow. Okay, that geometric arrangement, combined with the identical anomaly,
it forces you into that thought experiment territory, doesn't it.
Speaker 2: It really does, the coincidence thought experiment. You have two objects,
one confirmed interstellar, one rogue with an unusual orbit, possibly
also from outside the main system. They appear sequentially, they
end up in near perfect alignment with Earth, and they
share the exact same highly unusual physical property no tail,
despite intense solar heating.
Speaker 1: You have to ask, what are the odds of that
happening purely by random chance?
Speaker 2: It certainly strains credulity based on our current understanding of
typical object populations and behaviors. What's the likelihood of finding
two such rare, resilient, possibly metallic or rocky bodies appearing
one after the other in that specific lineup.
Speaker 1: It pushes the boundaries, especially when, as we discussed, their
survival might require physics or material science we don't fully
grasp yet.
Speaker 2: And this is where that provocative idea from the source
material comes in. It's speculative, highly speculative, but you see
why it emerges.
Speaker 1: The idea being if three i Atlists wasn't just a
passive object but could have released something.
Speaker 2: Yes, the thought experiment posits if hypothetically three iat Lists
launched a smaller component towards Earth sometime earlier, what would
that component look like by the time we detected it.
Speaker 1: Okay, we'd likely be smaller than Atlas, fainter.
Speaker 2: Correct, it would probably be made of the same tough,
non volatile material. So it also wouldn't have an obvious
tail and its position. Its position would be exactly where
V one Borisov was found between Alice and Earth. I'm
roughly the same trajectory.
Speaker 1: So the observed characteristics of VW one Borisov, smaller, fainter,
no tail, positioned directly in the path that they fit
that narrative quite neatly.
Speaker 2: They do fit the narrative description surprisingly well. But and
this is a huge butt, we.
Speaker 1: Have to apply critical thinking. Extreme claims require extreme evidence.
Speaker 2: Absolutely, the scientific hurdles to the launch idea are enormous. First,
the composition of Atlas itself inferred to be rocky, metallic,
non volatile. How would such an object launch a piece
of itself? What mechanism?
Speaker 1: It's not like a comet breaking apart due to thermal stress.
This thing seems solid.
Speaker 2: Exactly where would the energy come from to eject a
fragment with enough velocity to achieve V one? Borsov's current
orbit raises immense questions about propulsion, energy sources and the
structural integrity of Atlas itself.
Speaker 1: So while the alignment and matching anomalies make for a
compelling story.
Speaker 2: It remains firmly in the realm of thought experiment. We
absolutely must exhaust every plausible natural explanation first, and there
might be natural explanations we haven't considered yet. Maybe these
types of resilient objects are more common than we thought,
and this is just a statistical fluke alignment.
Speaker 1: We have to assume it's a sequence of bizarre but
natural events until we get definitive data proving otherwise.
Speaker 2: Without a doubt. But the mere fact that the non
natural possibility is even being whispered about, even as a
fringe thought experiment, tells you how truly weird and unexpected
these observations are.
Speaker 1: It means the universe is presenting astronomers with phenomena that
are forcing them to think outside the established boxes. Look
at the sky with fresh eyes.
Speaker 2: And we can't just look at these objects in isolation.
We have to consider the environment they're flying through. Right now,
the Sun is in incredibly active.
Speaker 1: Yeah, the solar activity context is huge here. This isn't
happening during a quiet solar minimum.
Speaker 2: Not at all. We're heading towards solar maximum and the
Sun is really churning out activity. There are large sunspot groups.
Speaker 1: Visible, and specifically sunspots on the side facing Earth.
Speaker 2: Yes, crucially, there are active regions on the Earth facing
side and they seem to be magnetically connected or aligned
towards an area astronomer's track called a six lemon.
Speaker 1: A six lemon, what does that signify? Is it just
a coordinate?
Speaker 2: It's essentially a region identified as being geo effective, Meaning
when active regions on the Sun are pointing towards a
six lemon, any eruptions from them, like chromal mass ejections
CMEs or high speed solar windstreams are highly likely to
be directed straight towards.
Speaker 1: Earth, like looking down the barrel of a gun.
Speaker 2: Basically, pretty good analogy. Yes, it funnels that solar energy
in those charged particles right into our neighborhood.
Speaker 1: And the suggestion is that these incoming objects interacting with
the Sun might be stirring things up even more.
Speaker 2: It's a plausible connection explored in the source. The idea
is that having these objects, particularly V one boris Off
plunging deep into the inner Solar system and interacting heavily
with the solar environment could help sustain or even amplify
the already high levels of solar activity for a.
Speaker 1: While, keeping the Sun excited, potentially leading to more flares
and seames aimed our way.
Speaker 2: Potentially it adds another layer of complexity to the space
weather forecast. We already have an active Sun, and now
we have these unusual visitors potentially adding to the mix.
Speaker 1: And we're already seeing the effects on Earth, aren't we
Geomagnetic storms?
Speaker 2: Yes, absolutely, the data shows heightened geomagnetic fluctuations. Recently, we
experienced a storm classified as G three minus GMx.
Speaker 1: Okay, G three, How serious is that?
Speaker 2: On the scale The scale goes from G one minor
to G five extreme. G three's classified as strong. It's
definitely significant.
Speaker 1: What kind of impacts can a G three storm have?
Speaker 2: At G three levels? You can start seeing problems intermittent
issues with set light navigation like GPS accuracy and low
frequency radio communications power grid operators might see voltage fluctuations
and might need to take corrective actions. Sometimes protective relays
can trip unnecessarily. Aurora displays become visible at much lower
latitudes than usual.
Speaker 1: So not catastrophic, but definitely noticeable and potentially disruptive to technology.
Speaker 2: Correct and a G five, just for comparison, could cause
widespread voltage control problems, grid collapses, transformer damage, widespread satellite
navigation outages for days, high frequency radio blackouts much more severe, and.
Speaker 1: The fact we were recently at G three levels meant
the expectation was for more activity.
Speaker 2: Yes, shortly after the period these observations cover, the forecasts
were for continued, strong, possibly even severe G four geomagnetic storms.
When the Sun is this active, and especially with these
potential alignment triggers, the impact on Earth's magnetic field is
direct and can be quite potent.
Speaker 1: Can you quickly explain how solar storms cause geomagnetic storms
on Earth? What's the mechanism?
Speaker 2: Sure? When a CME or a fast solar windstream hits
Earth's magnetosphere, our planet's magnetic shield, it compresses it and
transfers energy into it. This causes rapid fluctuations in the
magnetic field lines. These changing magnetic fields then induce electrical
currents in conductive materials on the Earth's surface. Think physics class.
Speaker 1: Changing magnetic field induces current electromagnetic induction exactly.
Speaker 2: These induced currents, called geomagnetically induced currents or GICs, flow
through long conductors like power lines, pipelines, railway signaling systems,
and communication.
Speaker 1: Cables, and that's where the damage happens.
Speaker 2: That's the risk. The extra current can overload systems, cause
transformers to overheat and potentially fail trip circuit breakers, leading
to blackouts or interfere with signaling.
Speaker 1: Okay, got it. It really connects the dots between distant
solar flares and potential problems right here.
Speaker 2: It absolutely does, which brings us back to that phrase
used by researchers mentioned in our sorel, the feeling that
the universe is running the simulation all the way through.
Speaker 1: It's such an evocative phrase. What do you think they
mean by that?
Speaker 2: I think it captures the feeling that we're seeing a
sequence of events that tests multiple systems at once. The
appearance of not one, but two highly anomalous objects, their
strange properties, their specific alignment coinciding with high solar activity
and the resulting geomagnetic effects. It feels like a full
stress test of our observational capabilities and our understanding of
the system.
Speaker 1: Like a drill, almost a cosmic fire drill.
Speaker 2: Exactly, And the underlying message, regardless of whether these objects
are natural rarities or something else, entirely is the same preparedness.
Speaker 1: Preparedness not just for weird space objects, but for the
tangible effects of space weather.
Speaker 2: Prefisely, this whole episode underscores the urgent practical need to
understand and prepare for severe space weather impacts on our
increasingly technology dependent society.
Speaker 1: You know that simulation idea really resonates. I remember years
ago training for this really intense multi day endurance race
in the mountains. Part of the prep involved practicing critical
tasks like setting up emergency shelters or navigating in the
absolute worst conditions. We could simulate middle of the night,
freezing rain, total exhaustion.
Speaker 2: Why to make sure your systems worked under.
Speaker 1: Pressure, exactly because you knew the real event could throw
anything at you. This feels similar. The Cosmos is throwing
this complex, unexpected scenario at us. It might not be
the big one yet, But it's a powerful reminder that
we need robust plans and infrastructure hardened against things like
major geomagnetic storms that could cripple power grids or communications someday.
It's a real world readiness check, and.
Speaker 2: It's happening right in our backyard. Cosmically speaking, v one
Borisov's peri helium inside Venus's orbit. The effects are close
to home. It really does drive home the need for
ongoing monitoring and infrastructure protection.
Speaker 1: It's almost painful, isn't it. We have this incredible cosmic
puzzle unfolding, potentially offering insights into new physics or exotic materials.
Speaker 2: A truly unique opportunity maybe once in a lifetime for
some aspects.
Speaker 1: And yet getting the clear, detailed data we desperately need
to actually understand three iAtlas and v one Boresov has
been really difficult roadblocks everywhere.
Speaker 2: It's incredibly frustrating for the scientific community. Yeah, especially concerning
three Alis, given's been around longer and is the confirmed
interstellar one.
Speaker 1: We did get some imagery recently, didn't we, from the
Chinese Mars probe.
Speaker 2: Yes, China's National Space Administration, the CNSA released images taken
by their tin orbiter around Mars. These were captured back
in early October, but released more recently.
Speaker 1: And were they helpful? Did they resolve the mysteries?
Speaker 2: Honestly not really. The image quality was disappointing, very low resolution, extremely.
Speaker 1: Pixelated, so basically a fuzzy blob pretty much.
Speaker 2: You could make out a general shape, maybe slightly elongated,
but certainly no surface details, no clues about composition. At
this stage, with such fundamental questions unanswered, those kinds of
low rist snapshots are almost more frustrating than helpful.
Speaker 1: Because they don't give you the specifics. You can't do
spectral analysis from a pixelated blob to figure out what
it's made of.
Speaker 2: Exactly, is it rock? Metal, carbon? Ice hidden under a crust?
Low resolution doesn't tell you. Now, there was a better
ground based observation from a Spanish observatory around November fifth.
Speaker 1: What did that show? It gave a clearer.
Speaker 2: View of the coma of three eye Atlis. Some analysis
suggested the coma might be slightly elongated pointing away from
the sun, which could hint it some minimal tail like
structure or outflow, But crucially it showed no major changes,
no big brightening or fragmentation even after the solar storms
it experienced around conjunction.
Speaker 1: So still holding together, still defiant. But we need more.
We need space telescopes right, high resolution.
Speaker 2: Stuff absolutely, which brings us to the major roadblock, especially
forgetting NASA data. We know the Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter MRO
was tasked with observ three iowas.
Speaker 1: Using its high rise camera. That thing takes incredibly detailed
pictures of Mars.
Speaker 2: That's the one high rise has the potential resolution to
possibly see surface features, get a much better estimate of
atalysis size and shape, maybe even spot variations in texture
or brightness that could hint at composition. That data is
scientifically vital.
Speaker 1: Oh we haven't seen it. Why not?
Speaker 2: It's delayed and the official reason cited in our source
material is a US government shutdown.
Speaker 1: Wait, really, politics, a government shutdown is holding that crucial
data about an interstellar object, potentially rewriting physics.
Speaker 2: That appears to be the situation described. It suggests that
political and bureaucratic issues are actively hindering the timely release
and possibly even processing of this key astronomical data.
Speaker 1: That's astounding and incredibly frustrating.
Speaker 2: It really is because timing is everything here. These objects
are moving fast. They won't be an optimal viewing position
forever if we don't get high quality data while they're
relatively close and bright, especially view one boris off around
its perihelion, that window closes.
Speaker 1: And the chance to understand what they're truly made of,
how they're surviving.
Speaker 2: Is lost, potentially lost, or at least significantly hampered, which
just ramps up the pressure on the Big space observatories.
Speaker 1: Hubble and the James web Space Telescope exactly.
Speaker 2: We desperately need them to target these objects get detailed spectra.
Spectra can tell us the chemical composition by analyzing the
light reflected or emitted. That's how we move beyond fuzzy
pictures and actually figure out the material science.
Speaker 1: Are there plans for them to observe.
Speaker 2: One hopes observation times being allocated, but these instruments are
in high demand, and there's another potential issue mentioned. Even
if the high rise data from MRO is eventually released,
there are concerns its resolution might still not be quite
good enough, perhaps due to the object speed blurring the
image or its surface having very low contrast.
Speaker 1: Making the need for Hubble and jwst even more critical.
They are the big guns we need to solve this.
Speaker 2: They really are. We need to get past the these roadblocks,
political or technical, and get our best instruments focused on
these cosmic anomalies before they fly past.
Speaker 1: Okay, let's try to wrap our heads around this whole situation.
We've got two main players dominating this story right now.
Speaker 2: Three I atlis the confirmed interstellar visitor, still out there,
still bafflingly resilient to the Sun, way brighter than calculations predicted,
and stubbornly refusing to grow a proper tale.
Speaker 1: And see twenty twenty five V one Borisov the newcomer,
maybe interstellar, maybe just rogue, following Atlas's path, diving even
closer to the Sun and critically showing the same baffling
lack of a tail.
Speaker 2: Both challenging are fundamental models of what comments are and
how they behave. There are apparent toughness hints at compositions rocky, metallic,
carbon rich maybe that are very different from the icy
bodies we expected, especially from interstellar space, and all.
Speaker 1: This is happening against a backdrop of intense solar activity.
Their appearance isn't just an isolated curiosity. It seems connected
geometrically and temporarily to the space weather environment.
Speaker 2: Which means tracking these objects isn't just about abstract astronomy anymore.
It's directly linked to monitoring the Sun, forecasting geomagnetic storms,
and understanding the energetic effects playing out right here potentially
impacting us on Earth.
Speaker 1: It really feels like we're in a unique moment. The
inner Solar System is actively hosting these unexpected, fast moving,
incredibly tough customers. It's like astrophysics is being rewritten in
real time right above our heads.
Speaker 2: And if these objects themselves are defying our expectations, if
they're built differently or obey slightly different rules than we assumed,
it makes you wonder what new physics, what new understanding
of materials might be revealed once we finally get past
these data roadblocks.
Speaker 1: When we finally get that high resolution compositional data from
web or Hubble, what secrets will they unlock?
Speaker 2: That's the billion dollar question, isn't it.
Speaker 1: It leads to a final thought, Really, if our current science,
our current instruments, are ingrained expectation, are struggling to fully
capture and explain these two objects that we have detected.
What else might be out there, What other unexpected travelers
might be silently crossing the vast distances between the stars
and our own solar system completely under our radar Right.
Speaker 2: Now, sobering thought the universe might be stranger than we.
Speaker 1: Imagine, We'll definitely keep watching this space. Thank you for
joining us on this deep dive.