The LIUniverse with Dr. Charles Liu

Chuck GPT 1.0 Year End Q&A

What happens to one sun of a binary pair if the other goes supernova? Can we mitigate the greenhouse effect? How big should a telescope be? For our Season 2 finale, we’re answering fan questions from YouTube, Instagram, and Facebook. To bring those questions to life, Dr. Charles Liu and co-host Allen Liu welcome two members of the LIUniverse social media team, “Vinyl Benjy” Schoenfeld, our TikTok manager, and Stacey Severn, our Social Media Director.
As always, though, we start off with the season’s final joyfully cool cosmic thing, the most recent image of Uranus by the James Webb Space Telescope. Taken using the JWST’s infrared imaging capabilities, rather than visible light, this incredibly beautiful photo of Uranus clearly shows its 7 spectacular rings and 14 moons.
Now, on to your questions! First, Stacey reads a question from YouTube fan Darker Void Scientist, who asks, “Wouldn’t some violently spinning galaxies produce strong magnetic fields that act as a barrier to some spectrum of traveling waves?”
To answer, Charles gets to discuss the Zeeman Effect and the Parker Instability. He explains that entire galaxies can’t spin fast enough, but that violent spinning does occur and produce magnetic fields closer to the supermassive black holes in the center of those galaxies.
Benjy reads our next question, from YouTube fan Mark Caesar 4443: “When stars go very near black holes and get sling-shotted around them, what would we see of them in terms of time dilation? Surely we would see them slow down as they approach the black hole, of course, that is assuming we can actually observe them.”
Chuck dives into what we would be able to perceive at all, from our perspective, and why we would see color shifts but not necessarily the impact of time dilation that the star itself would experience.
Allen tackles the next question, from Randy Starnes on Facebook, who wants to know whether we could take a rechargeable battery and use it to power a plasma rocket. Our co-host explains that while rechargeable batteries wouldn’t generate enough energy for a plasma engine, lithium-ion rechargeable batteries are used by Rocket Lab for the electric pumps on their reusable Electron rockets.
Stacey next asks another question from YouTube, from @sbkarajan: “How do NASA or anyone measure distance from the planet to the Sun? I heard for Earth they measure the distance to Mars or Venus transit using Keppler’s Third Law. Is it the only way?”
Chuck explains that when humanity was still stuck on Earth, that was the only way. But since we have more tactics at our disposal, from satellites to radar signals, to do far more accurate measurements, even at vast distances.
Next up, @frankwestphal8532 from YouTube: “What would happen to the other star in a supermassive star binary system if one of the stars ‘supernova-ed’ before the other?” It turns out that happens all of the time... and none of the outcomes tend to be good for the other star. But Frank’s not done, and his follow up question about the early universe, binary-system supernovae, and the creation of supermassive black holes is a bit of a chin-scratcher for Chuck!
Stacey’s next question comes via Instagram from our friends CJ Dearinger and Dr. Mounce on the “All Things – Unexplained” podcast: “When will astrophysics encounter/present undeniable proof of a new life form?” Predictions, obstacles, and discussion of alien cryptids ensue.
In another Instagram question, Ben Jordans asks, “How do you perceive the current efforts to mitigate the greenhouse effect? Are you of the opinion that we will succeed in mastering this problem, and if so, how?”
Chuck explains the greenhouse effect, on Earth as well as on Venus and Mars, and the difference between the effect itself and human involvement in it. He and Allen disagree as to how long it might take to redress the problem, while Stacey and Benjy jump in with their more pessimistic concerns about climate change, extreme weather, and the future.
Benjy gets the last question, from @emiliotorres2718 on YouTube: “How do we go about deciding how big we want a telescope to be? Is it simply the bigger the telescope we make, the farther we’ll be able to see into the universe?”
Chuck says the simple answer is yes, but the actual answer is more complicated. To hear it, you’ll have to watch or listen in to the final episode of Season 2 of The LIUniverse!
We hope you enjoy The LIUniverse, and, if so, please support us on Patreon. We’ll return for Season 3 in 2024.
Image Credits:
–Uranus and moons by JWST – NASA, ESA, CSA, STScI, Public Domain
–Time-lapse of stars near Milky Way’s central black hole – ESO/MPE, CC BY 4.0
–Rocket Lab’s Electron rocket – NASA Kennedy Space Center / Rocket Lab, Public Domain
–The Hobby–Eberly Telescope – Zereshk, CC BY 3.0
–3D model of Parker Solar Probe – NASA, Public Domain
–Chandra X-ray Observatory on the Space Shuttle – NASA, Public Domain
–Hubble photo of Saturn in UV light – NASA, Public Domain

Star Trucking with Franklin Chang-Diaz and Miranda Chang – Part 2

Welcome to Part 2 of our interview with father and daughter team Franklin Chang-Diaz, NASA astronaut and founder of the Ad Astra Rocket Company™, and Miranda Chang, Ad Astra’s Global Communications Director.
We pick up where we left off, with a focus on fathers working with their children! Host Charles Liu shares how much he loves doing The LIUniverse with his co-host and son Allen, while Franklin talks about how important Miranda is to the running of Ad Astra.
Then it’s on to our next question, from Ebony, who asks, “Do you believe that traveling to space can find ways to fix the problem with climate change?” Franklin begins by reminding us that we would not be aware of climate change if we were not exploring space. And then he describes how the life support system on spaceship Earth is in need of a great deal of maintenance and repair, how at some point there will be more humans than can survive on it, and how he worries that we will damage our environment to the point that our civilization won’t be healthy enough to explore space and then we will be doomed.
In Costa Rica, Ad Astra is working to transition the country to a green, hydrogen economy. Using solar and wind energy, they generate hydrogen from water, to power their fleet of hydrogen-powered vehicles and fuel cell electric buses. Miranda points out that Costa Rica’s electric grid is already nearly 100% renewable, making it a perfect based for doing test projects like these with the goal of reducing carbon.
Miranda discusses ways to make the economy of space more sustainable, too, and describes the fuel efficiency of the VX-200 VASIMIR engine (Variable Specific Impulse Magnetoplasma Rocket), their new high-power, electric in-space propulsion system that will have a thirteen-year lifespan.
Chuck asks Franklin how me made the transition from astronaut to environmentalist. Franklin explains how the Overview Effect impacted him, and how he came back from space with a tremendous awareness of our environmental problem. Charles brings up the differences between the Gaia Hypothesis and the Medea Hypothesis, which says the Earth may be out to get us and will be fine without us.
Somehow, the conversation leads to “The Inner Light” – one of the most beloved episodes of Star Trek The Next Generation, which had tremendous but differing impacts on Franklin and Charles. In the episode, a civilization ignores climate change to the point where it is too late for them to do anything except memorialize their lives and their fate. Miranda talks about the unifying impact of space exploration, and the necessary realization we must reach if we are to survive that we are one species all in this together.
Finally, we turn to VASIMIR. Chuck wants to know how it will change our lives, and Franklin likens it to the trucking business that sprung up after WWII because of the availability of diesel engines. As of right now, he explains that we don’t have an equivalent for space: “We still fly to space in cannonballs.” What we want, he says, is powered flight over longer periods of time, which VASIMIR makes possible, changing the entire economics of space and enabling humans and the private sector to engage in sustained activity in space.
Franklin explains how VASIMIR may someday reduce the time from the Moon to Mars from 8 months to 2 months or less and catalyze the next period of humanity’s expansion into our solar system. In fact, it turns out that the engine Andy Weir used in his book The Martian was based on VASIMIR!
To find out more about Ad Astra, visit their website, www.adastrarocket.com, or follow them on social media at @adastrarocket on YouTube, Instagram and Twitter, and @asastrarocketcompany on Facebook and LinkedIn.
We hope you enjoy this episode of The LIUniverse, and, if you do, please support us on Patreon.
Credits for Images Used in this Episode:
– Apollo 17’s Blue Marble photo of the Earth – NASA, Public Domain
– Crew of STS-60, first launch with US and Russian spacefarers – NASA, Public Domain
– Aurora from the ISS – NASA, Public Domain
 
#TheLIUniverse #CharlesLiu #AllenLiu #SciencePodcast #AstronomyPodcast  #FranklinChangDiaz #MirandaChang #NASA #VASOMIR #AdAstra #ionpropulsion #rockets #SpaceShuttle #HydrogenPoweredVehicles #FuelCell #ElectricBuses #OverviewEffect #StarTrekTheNextGeneration #TheInnerLight #STS60 #Cosmonauts #Astronauts #climatechange

Star Trucking with Franklin Chang-Diaz and Miranda Chang – Part 1

When humanity heads out for the stars, what will be powering our spacecraft? To find out, Dr. Charles Liu and co-host Allen Liu welcome father and daughter team Franklin Chang-Diaz, NASA astronaut and founder of the Ad Astra Rocket Company™, and Miranda Chang, Ad Astra’s Global Communications Director for Part 1 of this two-part episode. (We’ll be posting Part 2 next Saturday!)
As always, though, we start off with the day’s joyfully cool cosmic thing. Lucy, the robotic NASA mission to the asteroid belt, just passed by its first asteroid Dinkinesh (which has been given the Ethiopian (Amharic) name for the human-ancestor fossil known as Lucy and means “You are marvelous”!). As it did so, it discovered Dinkinesh is actually a double asteroid, in that it has its own orbiting moon, Selam, but that’s not all: Selam is a contact binary, meaning it’s actually two distinct bodies touching each other but not connected.
Next, we turn from discovering asteroids to visiting them, and that’s where Franklin and Miranda come in. Franklin spent 25 years at NASA. He was one of the ninth group of astronauts, the class of 1980, and flew 7 missions in space, the most spaceflights anyone has taken to date. An astronautic jack-of-all-trades engineer, physicist and more who describes himself as a “glorified plumber/electrician”), Franklin flew on each of the Space Shuttles except the Challenger, visited the Soviet space station Mir, took 3 spacewalks and even helped build the International Space Station.
Miranda tells us about Ad Astra’s flagship program, the VX-200 VASIMIR engine (Variable Specific Impulse Magnetoplasma Rocket), a new type of high-power, electric in-space propulsion. They’re vastly more powerful (compare a hair dryer to a diesel engine) and more efficient than existing ion propulsion systems.
We jump right into audience questions with one from Mohammed, who asks, “Engineering is problem solving. What happens when you can’t solve the problem?” According to Franklin, “In space, you work the problem until you find a solution and you never stop...eventually, you have to find something.” Miranda adds, “The whole idea of engineers is that there is never “no solution”...The are always working to find a solution...every time I think we’re don, there is no solution for that, they have like three...” Franklin also takes on the NASA mantra, “Failure is not an option.” In his experiences, “Failure is how you learn.... giving up is not an option.”
You’ll also hear about Miranda’s role and how creative storytelling is a critical aspect of helping people understand the complex technical realities of space exploration and the advanced propulsion systems and orbital mechanics Ad Astra deals with.
Miranda explains how Franklin got into the science of propulsion, and how he had started working on the VASOMIR engine even before he joined NASA. He was an engineer who spent a lot of time in the physics laboratory, and he came from Costa Rica specifically to become an astronaut during the burgeoning interest in space exploration during the period of the Apollo program.
That’s it for Part 1. Please tune in next Saturday for the conclusion.
We hope you enjoy this episode of The LIUniverse, and, if you do, please support us on Patreon.
Credits for Images and sounds Used in this Episode:
– NASA’s 1980 astronaut group, including Franklin – NASA, public domain
– Lucy spacecraft – NASA, public domain
– Lucy/Dink’inesh fossil – 120 on Wikimedia commons, CC BY 2.5
– Dinkinesh and its moon Selam – NASA/Goddard/SwRI/Johns Hopkins APL/NOAO, public domain
– Dinkinesh and Selam from the side – NASA/Goddard/SwRI/Johns Hopkins APL, public domain
– Franklin on a spacewalk (EVA) – NASA, public domain
– Canadarm 2 on the ISS – NASA, public domain
– Ad Astra’s VX-200 VASIMR test engine – Ad Astra Rocket Company™, from online media gallery
– NEXT, a typical electric ion engine – NASA, public domain
– STS-111, Franklin’s last shuttle launch – NASA, public domain
– Swoosh.wav – Berglindsi on Freesound, CC BY 3.0
 
#TheLIUniverse #CharlesLiu #AllenLiu #SciencePodcast #AstronomyPodcast  #FranklinChangDiaz #MirandaChang #asteroid #Lucy #Dinkinesh #NASA #VASOMIR #AdAstra #ionpropulsion #rockets #ISS #InternationalSpaceStation #SpaceShuttle #Challenger

Black Holes and Space Junk with Vivienne Baldassare

How do we find black holes? And how can we tell whether it’s a small black hole “eating” really fast or a large black hole that’s eating very slowly? To find out, Dr. Charles Liu and co-host Allen Liu welcome astrophysicist Dr. Vivienne Baldassare, a professor of astronomy and physics at Washington State University.
As always, though, we start off with the day’s joyfully cool cosmic thing, the recently published composite photo of the X-ray Binary System in nearby starburst galaxy NGC_4214. Vivienne explains how X-ray Binaries, which are relatively rare, are created by a stellar mass black hole or a neutron star being fed by a star.
Chuck and Vivienne discuss the differences between using the new James Webb Space Telescope and “old tech” like the Hubble Space Telescope and the Chandra X-ray Observatory, and how she uses Chandra to find black holes. Professor Baldassare explains how she uses x-ray observations, optical spectroscopy, and variability data to find intermediate-mass black holes, which she is one of the first astronomers to find. You’ll hear about the differences between stellar mass black holes, supermassive black holes, and the intermediate-mass back holes that fit somewhere between.
Then it’s time for our first student question, from Lorenzo, who asks, “Are stars only found in galaxies, and if not, where else?” Vivienne explains that most stars are found in galaxies, but they can also be found in globular clusters. There are also hyper-velocity stars, which can be found in the halo of our galaxy on their way to escape our galaxy entirely.
A discussion of the Chandra X-ray Observatory, which spends about 80% of its time outside the Van Allen belts, turns into a discussion about all the manmade objects orbiting the Earth, including Chandra, Hubble, satellites... and lots of space junk, too. We’ve currently got about 8,000 satellites orbiting Earth – a surprising amount of which are SpaceX Starlink satellites, with more “satellite constellations” planned by SpaceX and others. You’ll find out about the risk of chain-reaction debris collisions due to solar storms and other disruptive events, Kessler Syndrome, the environmental consequences of mostly-aluminum satellites burning up in our atmosphere, and the first fine every levied for space junk, against Dish Network.
For our next student question, Adrian wants to know how tiny black holes can swallow super giant stars? Vivienne explains how tidal disruption, when the gravity on one side of an object is greater than on the other side, can pull a star apart in months or even weeks!
Finally, Vivienne talks about being an ultra-marathon runner and a trail runner, hiking with her dog, and the importance of being able to go out to wild spaces in nature. Chuck gets here to share a favorite hiking memory – a 7-day, long distance solo hike around Mt. Blanc after presenting her work at a conference in France.
If you’d like to know more about Dr. Baldassare, you can follow her on Twitter @vbaldassare, Instagram @vbaldassare, or her website which includes her email for you to reach out to her and ask her more questions.
We hope you enjoy this episode of The LIUniverse, and, if you do, please support us on Patreon.
Credits for Images Used in this Episode:
– NGC_4214 (X-ray binary circled) –NASA, ESA and the Hubble Heritage Team (STScI/AURA)-ESA/Hubble Collaboration, Public Doman
– Artist’s impression of an X-ray Binary – Dana Berry/NASA Goddard Space Flight Center, Public domain
– Launch of Hubble on shuttle flight STS-31 – NASA, Public Domain
– Illustration of the Chandra X-ray Observatory – NASA/CXC/NGST, Public Domain
– Our Milky Way’s central black hole – EHT Collaboration, CC BY 4.0
– Globular cluster NGC 1466 – ESA/NASA (Hubble), Public Domain
– Orbit of the Chandra X-ray Observatory – NASA, Public Domain
– Starlink trails on a CTIO telescope image – NSF’s National Optical-Infrared Astronomy Research Laboratory/CTIO/AURA/DELVE, CC BY 4.0
– Diagram of tides in Earth’s oceans – Orion 8 on Wikimedia Commons, Public Domain
#TheLIUniverse #CharlesLiu #AllenLiu #SciencePodcast #AstronomyPodcast  #blackhole #globularclusters #hypervelocitystars #XrayBinary #starburstgalaxy #NGC4214 #stellarmassblackhole #neutronstar #MilkyWayGalaxy #HubbleSpaceTelescope #ChandraXrayObservatory #supermassiveblackholes #intermediatemassbackholes #VanAllenbelts #SpaceX #Starlink #satelliteconstellations #spacejunk #satellites #KesslerSyndrome #tidaldisruption 

Final Frontiers with Jeyhan Kartaltepe

In this episode of The LIUniverse, Dr. Charles Liu and co-host Allen Liu welcome Dr. Jeyhan Kartaltepe, an astronomer and professor at the Rochester Institute of Technology, who studies galactic evolution, including galactic collisions and the growth of black holes, to explore final frontiers, both real and fictional.
 
As always, though, we start off with the day’s joyfully cool cosmic thing, the first data drop from COSMOS-Web, a database of the deepest, coolest, largest field of deep space ever imaged by JWST, and the largest scientific project yet to be conducted by the James Webb Space Telescope.
 
Dr. Jeyhan Kartaltepe was co-leader of the effort and an integral part of the COSMOS team, which started with 50 people and has grown since then, and which started working on this project long before the JWST launched. Jeyhan also talks about the Redshift Wrangler project, a citizen science project that’s part of the COSMOS-Web and that anyone can contribute to.
 
We jump into our first student question, from Jonathan, who asks, “Why is there a black hole in the center of our galaxy, and how many galaxies are there in the universe?” Dr. Kartaltepe explains that we think there’s a supermassive black hole in the center of every galaxy, but where they come from is still a mystery. We understand where “regular” black holes come from, but these are still “head scratchers.” And as to how many galaxies there are, the current estimate is in the trillions, and that doesn’t even count the ones that are too far away even to see.
 
Next, Chuck takes the opportunity to ask Jeyhan about whether or not there really is a galactic barrier like the one shown in Star Trek V – The Final Frontier. And while we don’t actually know where our galaxy ends, Dr. Kartaltepe explains that there is no hard barrier around it. Jeyhan shares how as a child she watched Star Trek: The Original Series with her father, and has watched all of the subsequent series since, and that it helped shape her love of science and her social experience. And get this – Chuck shares that his wife is an even bigger Star Trek geek than he is, and his love of Trek helped him win her over!
 
Jeyhan, like Chuck, is on Team Star Trek vs. Team Star Wars, and the pair discuss what they like and don’t like about each, ending up in a three-way discussion with Allen about the morality of different races in Star Trek, and the similarities and differences between the Borg Collective and our concerns about Artificial Intelligence. Oh, and which Captain of the Enterprise does Jeyhan think is the best? You’ll have to watch/listen to the episode to find out.
 
Then it’s time for another student question, from Cynthia: “In a way, the brain has a bunch of  similarities to the universe. Is there a connection between the two, logically or illogically?” According to Jeyhan, one of the biggest similarities is how little we know about each. Philosophical pondering about understanding complexity ensues.
 
Chuck has his own question for Jeyhan: How often do galaxies interact with each other? She says it’s fairly common: our Milky Way galaxy is already interacting with the small galaxies next to us, the Small and Large Magellanic Clouds, and has interacted with other small galaxies in the past. And, as we all know, there’s a collision with Andromeda galaxy heading our way in billions of years, and Dr. Kartaltepe describes what might happen when it does.
 
Finally, we turn to the impending Great North American Eclipse, a total solar eclipse that will be passing directly over Rochester on April 8, 2024.
 
If you’d like to know more about Dr. Kartaltepe’s work, you can follower her on Twitter/X at @jeyhan, or follow COSMOS-Web at @cosmosastro. You can also find out more on the web at https://cosmos.astro.caltech.edu/.
 
You can find out more about the Redshift Wrangler citizen science project here on Zooniverse.org: https://www.zooniverse.org/projects/jeyhansk/redshift-wrangler.
 
We hope you enjoy this episode of The LIUniverse, and, if you do, please support us on Patreon.
 
Credits for Images Used in this Episode:
 
– The first image data from COSMOS-Web– Kartaltepe/Casey/Franco/Larson, RIT/UT Austin/CANDIDE
– Spectrum of galaxy ARP 193 – Charles Liu
– Simulation of a dark matter halo around a galaxy – Cosmo0 on Wikipedia, Public DOmain
– An EEG recording of brain activity – Laurens R. Krol, Public Domain
– The Magellanic Clouds – ESO, CC BY 4.0
 

Star Treks, Star Wars, and Star Domes with Jenny Powers and Elliot Severn

Have you ever wondered what it would be like to be a science educator and work at a planetarium or science museum? Even better, to run one?
To find out, Dr. Charles Liu and co-host Allen Liu welcome Elliot Severn, the Planetarium Director at Sacred Heart University’s Discovery Science Center and Planetarium, and Jenny Powers, the Director of the Springfield Science Museum.
As always, though, we start off with the day’s joyfully cool cosmic thing that has just come down to Earth: the samples of the asteroid Bennu that were collected by the OSIRIS-REx mission! As Charles explains, these samples could give us clues about the evolution of the earliest parts of our solar system. Elliot shows us a cosmic sample of his own: his wedding ring, made from the Gibeon meteorite and actually transported back to space temporarily on Blue Origin NS22. Elliot, who is a space photographer who has been to over 20 space mission launches, was actually at the launch of OSIRIS-REx on September 8, 2016!
And then it’s time to put our guest science educators to work with our student question, from Rachelle: “Why do zodiac signs have the same names as stars?” It’s easy to imagine yourself sitting in the dark in a planetarium, looking up at the stars on the ceiling as Planetarium Director Elliot talks about the constellations in the path of the Ecliptic, and all 13 constellations in the Zodiac. (Yes, there are 13 – but we’ll let Elliot explain why.) He also explains that constellations tend to have Latin names but some of the brightest stars have Arabic names.
Charles and Jenny talk about how we are all connected under the night sky. She explains how her museum is making astronomy more accessible to people by bringing different cultural perspectives into their exhibits. Jenny also describes how they are developing techniques to help people with low or no sight, who can’t simply go outside and look up, appreciate the stars through tactile exhibits and the use of sound.
Elliot, who is also an Astronomy Professor at SHU, describes getting his first telescope at 9 years old and learning how to use it with the help of the members of the Booth Park Astronomy Club in Stratford, Ct. He also talks about Sidewalk Astronomy, where you bring telescopes to public places to let people discover the wonders of the stars free of charge. Elliot shares about his friendship with amateur astronomer John Dobson, the inventor of the Dobsonian telescope who is credited with vastly increasing the numbers of amateur astronomers and popularizing Sidewalk Astronomy.
Jenny talks about her journey from education department and family engagement coordinator to museum director, and how her experiences with her astronomy mentor Richard Sanderson led her to fall in love with planetariums, their technology, and their histories. Jenny and Elliot get a little geeky talking about their various projectors and domes, from original, historically important equipment to modern, digital systems and virtual reality.
Of course, this being The LIUniverse, we end up in a discussion about Star Trek and Star Wars, with Charles encouraging Elliot and Jenny to explain which they prefer and why. (Tune in to hear Charles’ impression of Darth Vader.) Elliot champions Star Trek, and also runs us through why this is a golden age for Trek fans, with a plethora of new series to enjoy. Jenny, on the other hand, is on Team Star Wars, and uses the opportunity to point out that the “science” in Star Trek is often... not.
To find out more about Jenny’s work, visit springieldmuseums.org or catch up with the Museum on Facebook, LinkedIn, Twitter and Instagram.
For Elliot, visit SHUdiscovery.org, and check them out on social media, especially Facebook.
And of course, you can find either of them in real life by visiting their institutions.
We hope you enjoy this episode of The LIUniverse, and, if you do, please support us on Patreon.
 
Credits for Images Used in this Episode:
– SHU Discovery Science Center and Planetarium – Elliot Severn, used with permission
– Springfield Science Museum – Daderot via Wikimedia Commons, Public Domain
– The OSIRIS-REx sample being recovered – NASA/Keegan Barber, Public Domain
– Illustration of the Ecliptic in Aquarius – Johann Elert Bode, Public Domain
– Galileo Galilei – Justus Sustermans
– Passage tomb in Knowth, Ireland, home to 5000-year-old Moon drawings – Jemartin03, CC BY 2.0

Stars vs. Planets with Dr. Tom Rice

How did our solar system get here? How did the Earth form? How commonly does that happen elsewhere, and how often do the conditions necessary for life come about?
To find out, Dr. Charles Liu and co-host Allen Liu welcome Dr. Tom Rice, Astronomer-Educator and AAS staffer, who studies star and planet formations, how solar systems come together out of the “stuff that’s out there floating in our galaxy like gas and dust.”
As always, though, we start off with the day’s joyfully cool cosmic thing, the discovery of “baby” brown dwarf TWA 27B that we are watching grow thanks to the James Webb Space Telescope. Tom explains that a brown dwarf is not massive enough to ignite the hydrogen in their cores and turn into a star, but is 13 times more massive than gas giant planets like Jupiter. Allen asks Tom about temporal scales and “baby objects” – Tom defines objects as “young” that are still accreting mass, and tend to be in the range of 1-10 million years old. And as for calling brown dwarfs failed stars, well, you’ll just have to watch or listen for Tom’s opinion about that very controversial subject.
Then it’s time for a student question, from Alianna, who asks, “Can a star turn into a planet?” To answer, Tom uses a different distinction between stars, brown dwarfs, and planets: how they form. He explains the development from a region of gas and dust that gets dense and then collapses under its own weight, into a circumstellar disc accreting matter with an object at its center, growing either into a star, or, if it’s too low a mass to ignite, a brown dwarf. A planet forms in a different process, not in the center of the circumstellar disc (aka, the protoplanetary disc) but out of the “stuff” in the disc, at the same time the star is forming. So, Tom says, the answer to the question is “probably no.” Tom and Chuck then discusss a couple of hypothetical situations that could possibly reduce a star to the mass of the planet. They also compare the atmosphere composition of planets and stars. In the case of Jupiter, the composition is very similar to the sun, but the temperature is much cooler, so there are some molecules that form in its atmosphere that would remain in their atomic states in the Sun.
Then we enter the goldilocks zone to discuss what it takes to create a planet that can sustain life, like on Earth. Tom runs down the “must haves” for life, and then turns to the search for earthlike exoplanets using the Kepler and TESS space telescopes. You’ll learn about the transit method of exoplanet detection and what we can learn from it, including size and orbital frequency (which helps determine distance from the sun and therefore habitable temperatures).
Next we hear about Tom’s work on the staff of the American Astronomical Society. His focus: figuring out how channel the energy of society members to improve astronomy education at all levels. If you have a suggestion for Tom, you can find him on Twitter (X) @tomr_stargazer or email him at tom.rice@aas.org.
This being The LIUniverse, Chuck Tom and Allen end up the episode talking about video games, from Super Planet Crasher to Space Engine 2 and Universe Sandbox to the Zelda game, Tears of the Kingdom which has a ton of physics stuff in it– yes, you read that right!
By the way, if Tom looks familiar to you, that might be because he was in our video Chuck recorded at the AAS meeting in Pasadena last year where he showed us his fluency with American Sign Language. Tom is a CODA (Child of Deaf Adults)  and ASL and his signing identity is an important part of his heritage. He lives in Washington, DC, near Gallaudet University, the nation’s only entirely signing university, where Tom works with the Astronomy Club. He’s also working with The National Technical Institute for the Deaf at Rochester Institute of Technology on activities relating to the upcoming total solar eclipse on April 8, 2024 that will pass directly overhead.
If you want to see Tom sign a few astronomic terms including the one for “the planet we live on...the most important place we can know,” watch our video at https://www.instagram.com/reel/Ce4kc96gOT5/.
We hope you enjoy this episode of The LIUniverse, and, if you do, please support us on Patreon.
 
Credits for Images Used in this Episode:
– TWA 27B (left) and its larger companion (right) – European Southern Observatory, CC BY 4.0
– Circumstellar Disc (artist’s concept) – ESO/L. Calçada, CC BY 4.0
– Illustration of the origin of a Type Ia supernova – NASA, Public Domain
– The Kepler and TESS space telescopes – NASA, Public Domain
– Transit detection of exoplanet WASP-96 b – NASA, ESA, CSA, STScI, and the Webb ERO Production Team, CC BY 4.0
– Gallaudet University’s Chapel Hall – Carol M. Highsmith, Public Domain
– The National Technical Institute for the Deaf, at RIT – Photog, CC BY 3.0
– Path of the April 8, 2024 Total Solar Eclipse – NASA's Scientific Visualization Studio - Michala Garrison, Ernie Wright, Ian Jones, Laurence Schuler, Public Domain.

New York Comic Con: The Science of Sci-Fi 2021

Why does Wakanda have no suburbs, and should we destroy them if it did? Is it ethical to become a cyborg, like in the Justice League? Can venom – the toxins or the Marvel character – save your life? In this 2021 New York Comic Con edition of “The LIUniverse,” Astronomer Dr. Charles Liu hosts venom researcher Dr. Mandë Holford and environmental expert Kendra Pierre-Louis for our panel “The Science of Science Fiction.”
Speaking to a packed room (in a convention ‘plagued’ by empty panels and COVID-19 attendance limits) the panelists share their insights into the science within the Marvel and DC comics and movies as well as the rest of geekdom. In our three segments on nature, technology, and the multiverse, you’ll hear about superhumans and mutants from Spider-Man to the X-Men to Captain Planet. You’ll also learn some science, like how a version of string theory predicts a parallel universe where gravity would give us all superpowers.
One of our favorite parts of our panels is taking questions from the audience. This time, fans like you asked some great ones. How will gene editing change the world? Can we tell if an AI, such as the Vision, is really self aware? Does scientific advancement need military rivalries as in “For All Mankind,” a show that flips the space race on its head? What will be the biggest technological advancement of the next 100 years: perhaps miniature organs, or maybe social innovations, or something else entirely? Plus, find out what on Earth “life expectancy escape velocity” is, and what it could mean for the future of humanity.
You can expect to hear about some of your favorite comic superheroes on screen and off, like Black Panther, The Avengers, Wandavision, The Suicide Squad, Braniac, Falcon and the Winter Soldier, Black Widow, Loki, The Fantastic Four, Lex Luthor, Ant-Man, and – lest we forget – The Incredible Hulk.  Relive the experience (if you were lucky enough to be there) or find out what you missed!  Geek out with us!
Chapters:
0:00 Nature and Our Relationship to It
16:34 Technology, Humans, and Superheroes
34:26 The Multiverse: Reality and Fiction
All characters and comic properties are the copyright of their respective owners.

Boston Fan Expo: The Science of Sci-Fi

How realistic is the human augmentation depicted in comic, games and movies? To find out, Dr. Charles Liu welcomes the CEO/founder of Neurobionics Dr. MJ Antonini, experimental psychologist Liam McMahon, and our own social media maven and comic/gaming uber-geek Sarah Cotten to the stage for our first-ever appearance at the Boston Fan Expo for a discussion about the science of science fiction, and most particularly, BRAINS! (NOTE: This panel took place during the 2023 writers strike, so our panelists purposefully avoided naming characters our properties out of respect for the striking creators.) 
The panel starts off with a discussion of the feasibility of the kind of human augmentation featured in the dystopian near-future game series Deus Ex. Dr. Antonini, whose company is all about human augmentation and wearable robotics, says that it’s not as far away from reality as you might think. Dr. McMahon talks about using magnetism to perceive what’s going on inside the human mind. Meanwhile, Sarah comes up with a reality TV show concept where people can see through the prosthetic eye of the show’s protagonist.
When Liam brings up the concept of memory augmentation, sharing and retrieval, Charles immediately reminds us all of Philip K. Dick’s “We Can Remember It for You Wholesale,” perhaps better known as the Arnold Schwarzenegger movie “Total Recall.”
You’ll hear about exoskeletons that can help paralyzed people walk and even kick a soccer ball, and research by David Sinclair at Harvard into slowing down the aging process or even reversing the aging of the human brain. Of course, as Sarah points out, living forever is different than being young forever, unless of course you’re an ageless vampire with a bulging bank account. The panel discusses the impact of immortality on resources, offspring, and the human psyche, which gives Chuck the opportunity to reference “The Last Question” by Isaac Asimov.
Of course, there’s no avoiding the subject of Artificial Intelligence and the Internet, and the morality and ethics of both, which naturally leads into a discussion of dystopian, post-apocalyptic fiction and games like “Fallout” and the seminal and influential 1984 anime fantasy film “Nausicaä of the Valley of the Wind” by the legendary Hayao Miyazaki.
The panel ends with a discussion of Alzheimer’s disease, brain augmentation and uploading, what makes personality, and the metaphysical thought experiment known as the Ship of Theseus.
Normally at conventions like this, we end with a vigorous Q&A session, and this event was no exception. But this time if you’d like to hear the Q&A and the rest of the panel content that didn’t make it into this video, you’ll have to check it out on Patreon.
We hope you enjoy this episode of The LIUniverse, and, if you do, please also support us on Patreon. 

Planet Formation with Dr. Holly Capelo

How do planets form out of dust particles? And what does that have to do with fluid dynamics? To find out, Dr. Charles Liu and co-host Allen Liu welcome astrophysicist Dr. Holly Capelo from the University of Bern in Switzerland.
 
As always, though, we start off with the day’s joyfully cool cosmic thing, which takes us to the Observatory of Paris, where a group of scientists are delving into the formation of planetesimals. What are they, where do they come from, and when do they form? Holly dives right in to explain what we know about them, and what forces might prevent planetesimals from growing into planets. Along the way, she blows Chuck’s mind about planet formation and accretion disks.
 
Next, Dr. Capelo uses Alice in Wonderland to help describe her extensive experiments flying on Novespace’s Air Zero-G (the European equivalent of NASA’s “Vomit Comet”) flying in parabolas in order to better understand fluid dynamics, aerodynamic drag and the impact of freefall, microgravity and hypergravity on dust particles.
 
For our first question this episode, Allen asks Holly about what makes up interplanetary debris, now and in the past. You’ll learn all about ice lines, the impact of vacuum on water vapor and dust particles, minimum mass solar nebulas, density distributions and how much debris there actually is floating around our solar system. 
 
You’ll also hear a little bit about Holly’s other experiences, as a dancer, and how grad school made it harder to stay in shape.
 
Our next question revolves around the possible atmospheres of the Moon, comets and planetesimals. Holly explains how we have evidence of transitory events, like outgassing. She also tells us about an upcoming “comet interceptor” mission to study comets that will place a satellite at a Lagrange point to wait for a comet to enter our solar system and then fly to meet it. 
 
If you’d like to know more about Holly and her experiments, you can follow her on Twitter @hollycapelo.
 
We hope you enjoy this episode of The LIUniverse, and, if you do, please support us on Patreon. 
 
Credits for Images Used in this Episode:
Accretion disks imaged by ALMA – European Southern Observatory, CC BY 4.0Phase diagram of water – Hokanomono & Cmglee on Wikimedia, CC BY-SA 3.0Novespace’s Air Zero-G aircraft – Marc Lacoste, CC BY-SA 4.0Illustration of Rosetta at comet 67P – Deutsches Zentrum für Luft- und Raumfahrt, CC-BY 3.0