Pythagorean Astronomy

In October 2015 we had news of the discovery of water on Mars – again! Almost a perennial story now, but is this discovery any different to previous discoveries, some of which stretch back to the 1970s? To find out more about this particular story, I spoke to UCL planetary scientist Peter Grindrod. Originally broadcast on 29th October 2015 as part of Pythagoras’ Trousers on Radio Cardiff.

AstroCamp (credit PhysicistPat@Flickr) The arrival of Autumn means one thing to astronomers: darker skies. Every spring an autumn, astronomers gather along with their telescopes, campervans and tents for “star parties”. One such meet-up is AstroCamp, held near Cwmdu in the Brecon Beacons. At just an hour or so north of Cardiff it’s not too far, and I’ve been going along to these meetings for the last few years. The weather can be unpredictable, and while that can put a stop to observing the skies, it does little to dampen the spirits. Astronomers are a pretty social bunch, and enjoy sharing in the experience. I thought I’d ask a few of the AstroCamp-ers what attracted them to astronomy and AstroCamp, and what got them started in the first place. It’s also been a busy summer for a few Cardiff astronomers, with an analysis of data from the Herschel Space Observatory and the Hubble Space Telescope revealing how galaxies evolve and change over cosmic time. I spoke to two Cardiff members of the international colla

67P/Churyumov-Gerasimenko (ESA/Rosetta/NavCam) On Monday 24th August, Cardiff was treated to a public talk by Prof Mark McCaughrean, Senior Science Advisor in the European Space Agency’s Directorate of Science and Robotic Exploration. Mark spoke about the Rosetta mission, which has been studying comet 67P/Churyumov-Gerasimenko for the past year, including the landing of Philae on the comet’s surface amid huge media attention. In this month’s Pythagorean Astronomy, I had a fascinating chat with Mark about his work at ESA, and his role leading the communications department. The public attention around Rosetta helped make it one of the great successes of the modern space age, and that is largely thanks to the efforts of the ESA science communications team – whether that be the press events around key mission milestones, the science fiction movie “Ambition“, or the anthropomorphism of the spacecraft in a series of short cartoons. But it’s not without its adverse effects, as the science teams behind the cameras a

On 14th July 2015 the New Horizons probe whizzed past Pluto, providing our first ever close-ups of this tiny world at the edge of our Solar System. This month, Edward Gomez and I discuss why Pluto is so fascinating, and what the first few images have told us. We also chatted about this month’s other big story, the discovery of another Earth-like planet, and why it’s a bit early to get too excited about future holiday plans! And Hugh Lang tells us about August’s Perseid meteor shower. To get a feel for why New Horizons has proved so fascinating, and why we want to know more about Pluto, we also hear from a number of other people at this year’s National Astronomy Meeting in Llandudno: Jane Greaves (University of St Andrews) Jen Gupta (University of Portsmouth) Megan Argo (University of Manchester) Steve Serjeant (Open University) Simon Green (Open University) Manuel Grande (Aberystwyth University) Charles Barclay (Blackett Observatory, Marlborough College) David Southwood (Imperial College London, Ret’d Direct

Radio telescopes are normally used for looking at very distant objects thousands, millions, or possibly even billions of light years away. But to do that, they have to look through the Earth’s atmosphere. For some radio astronomers the distorting effects of our atmosphere are an annoyance, but earlier this year Australian astronomers using the Murchison Widefield Array found something theorised to exist but never before seen: tubes of ionised plasma tracing our planet’s magnetic field. I spoke to Dr Natasha Hurley-Walker from the International Centre for Radio Astronomy Research about the discovery, as well as a few much more local radio phenomena… Originally broadcast (in edited form) on 25th June 2015 as part of Pythagoras’ Trousers on Radio Cardiff.

It’s a busy year in the Solar System for robotic explorers, with New Horizons on the way to distant Pluto, Dawn orbiting Ceres in the outer asteroid belt, and Rosetta and Philae accompanying comet 67P/Churyumov-Gerasimenko as it makes its closets approach to the Sun. This month Dr Edward Gomez and I chat about these missions, as well as some recent results about exploding stars way across the cosmos! Originally broadcast (in edited form) on 28th May 2015 as part of Pythagoras’ Trousers on Radio Cardiff.

The Messenger probe arrived in orbit around Mercury in March 2011, after a 7 year journey to the innermost planet in our Solar System. It mapped the entire surface of this tiny planet, of which we’d seen less than half from the previous mission back in the 1970s. Far from being a dry, inert ball of rock, Messenger has showed that the surface of Mercury has been changing in the very recent past (where “recent”, to a planetary scientist, means tens of millions of years). But what goes up, must come down, and on 30th April 2015 the Messenger probe crashed into the surface of Mercury. Professor Dave Rothery is a planetary scientist at the Open University, and a member of the Bepi Columbo mission, which will launch in a few years to arrive at Mercury in a decade’s time. In this month’s programme, Dave describes the mysteries that Messenger has solved, but also those that remain for Bepi Columbo to solve. Originally broadcast (in edited form) on 30th April 2015 as part of Pythagoras’ Trousers on Radio Cardiff.

In this special documentary as part of the Pythagoras Trousers radio series, Rhys Phillips visits his alma mater, Cardiff University’s School of Physics & Astronomy, to find out about a new generation of detectors being developed to help see things in the far infra-red part of the spectrum. With contributions from Chris North, Peter Hargave, Simon Doyle and Ken Wood. Originally broadcast on 2nd April 2015 as part of Pythagoras’ Trousers on Radio Cardiff.

In March 2015 there was an eclipse of the Sun. Those who saw the total eclipse from the North Atlantic witnessed one of the most awesome sights imaginable. From more southerly locations we saw a partial eclipse, and in Cardiff we were joined by over 1000 people on the steps of the National Museum of Wales. But eclipses aren’t just a pretty sight, and they can be used for scientific purposes. As well as showing us the outer atmosphere of the Sun, they are also able to tell us about the fabric of the Universe itself. This month, I spoke to Mark Hannam, a researcher here in Cardiff, about what eclipses have taught us about gravity, and what we’re still learning today. You can also read Mark’s blog post about some of the concepts involved. Read more

Chris North In March 2015 there will be an eclipse of the Sun. From the UK (apart from a couple of very tiny northern parts) it will be visible as a partial eclipse. In this month’s episode Edward Gomez and I chatted about eclipses and their historical significance. February 2015 also saw the release of new data from the Planck Satellite. I spoke to Hiranya Peiris, from University College London, about what the results are telling us. Read more

Chris North In January it was announced that images from spacecraft orbiting Mars had probably located signs of Beagle 2, the unfortunate UK mission to the red planet which went missing back in 2003. This month I chatted to LCOGT’s Edward Gomez, who has been following proceedings, about what this means – including that the UK now holds the record for Europe’s first soft landing on another planet! But current and future missions have also been in the news. NASA’s Dawn spacecraft is rapidly approaching Ceres, and New Horizons will whizz past Pluto in the Summer. Unprecedented close-ups of these two dwarf planets should tell us much more about how our Solar System formed. Not forgetting, of course, Rosetta and the Philae lander, which are investigating coemt 67P/Churyumov-Gerasimenko. Read more

It has been announced that the UK will lead the design and build of Europe’s next rover to Mars. Part of the European Space Agency’s ExoMars programme, this robotic explorer will drill down up two metres to search for signs of microbial life beneath the Martian surface. To find out about the rover, its mission, and the challenges involved I spoke to the ExoMars Systems Engineer Paul Meacham, based at Airbus Defence & Space, about the project and the technical challenges involved. Read more

Chris North On 12th November 2014, the Philae lander separated from its mothership, ESA’s Rosetta spacecraft, and made history by making the first ever soft landing on a comet. It wasn’t quite as soft as hoped, with Philae experiencing more than its fair share of ups and downs, but it provided an nerve-wracking few days for those of us watching from afar. It must have been far worse in the lander control room, with the teams struggling to get as much science as possible out of the lander. One of the scientific instruments on board was the UK-led Ptolemy instrument – essentially a miniaturised chemistry-lab. I spoke to Ptolemy team member Dr Geraint Morgan, from the Open University, about Philae’s adventures, the science of Ptolemy, and the possible future of the mission. Read more

On of Mars Orbiter Mission’s first images of Mars from orbit In late September, two new missions arrived ion orbit around Mars. One was India’s first mission, the Mars Orbiter Mission, while the other was NASA’s MAVEN spacecraft. MAVEN’s goal is not to study the surface of the planet but its atmosphere, with the aim of determining how it is changing and how it may have changed in the past. One of the leading experts in the Martian atmosphere is Professor Peter Read, based at the University of Oxford. For this month’s edition of Pythagoras’ Trousers, I spoke to Peter about what we know – and what we don’t – about the atmosphere of the red planet. Read more

August marked the arrival Loncon 2014, the annual science fiction convention which visits a different city every year. There’s also a lot of science fact presented at such meetings – we were showcasing the results from Herschel and Planck, for example. In fact there are a lot of places where, to a greater or lesser degree, science fiction meets science fact. It’s not just the stories where the two meet, either, but also the people involved in producing them. For this month’s instalment of Pythagoras’ Trousers, I spoke to Alastair Reynolds, a science fiction author who used to be an astronomer. Having worked in St Andrews University and in ESA, Alastair is now based in Wales. Most of his novels, not to mention the many short stories, are set in worlds based on the science we know about today – albeit extrapolated centuries into the future. Our conversation ranged from his astronomical career, how novels are written and the importance of scientific accuracy. We even even touched on some of the latest technologi

Between 23rd and 26th June 2014 over 600 astronomers gathered in Portsmouth for the annual National Astronomy Meeting. This meeting, organised by the Royal Astronomical Society, provides the opportunity for physicists, astronomers, space scientists and cosmologists to discuss the latest developments in their areas of research. It covers a huge range of topics, so cosmologists can find out about what’s happening on the Sun, or planetary scientists can hear about the formation of stars. For this month’s instalment of Pythagoras’ Trousers, I spoke to a few scientists I met while at the conference: Edward Gomez, Helen Fraser, Jane Greaves, and Brooke Simmons. You can listen to the extended version of the astronomy segment below, or listen to the full Pythagoras Trousers episode. Read more

For the 31st March episode of Pythagoras’ Trousers, I reported from the Cambridge Science Festival, specifically at the Institute of Astronomy‘s open afternoon. As well as speaking to a number of the exhibitors (and vistors) at the Institute, I also spoke to a few of the cosmologists about the latest results from the BICEP2 experiment (which Cardiff scientists were involved in – read more about that on The Conversation) .  Read more

Once a month, I take a look at some of the latest news in astronomy as part of Pythagoras’ Trousers, a weekly science show broadcast on Radio Cardiff. The show’s main presenter is Rhys Phillips, a research engineer and musician who graduated from the School of Physics and Astronomy in 2008, but once a month he hands the microphone to me to discuss what’s been occurring in the world of astronomy. Read more