Above and Beyond...

Episode 219 - Reef Renewal USA

On September 15, 2017, the Cassini spacecraft, one of the greatest spacecraft to ever study space, ended its thirteen year mission of Saturn after sending back enormous amounts of data.   

Only designed for a five year mission, Cassini was running out of fuel.  So the decision was made to plunge it into Saturn—to burn up in the atmosphere, instead of contaminating nearby moons.  

The days leading up to its final moments were called the mission’s ‘Grand Finale’ where on its final day it took one last picture of where it would plummet, before turning off its bandwidth-hungry cameras completely.  

It would need all its powers to sample the Saturnian atmosphere and transmit that data to Earth.  One last time.

In its final moments its instruments tasted the gasses at 76,000 miles per hour.  

At 6:21 AM it fired ten percent thruster capacity to stay on course.  Heat increasing.  One minute later thrusters were at a hundred percent, fighting from tumbling.  

Then… silence.
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Recorded at Jacksonville University
Eddie Whisler | Story & Voice
Greg Minton | Audio Engineer
Tony Steve | Music
Andy Ouellette | Producer & Editor
David Smith | Logo Design
Bryan Gros | Space Art

#078 | Cassini's Grand Finale | Aired 9-11-20 on WJCT 89.9 FM Jacksonville

Cassiopeia is a constellation that immortalizes the vain Queen of Ethiopia, mother of the beautiful Princess Andromeda and wife of King Cepheus.  

Although the entire family is enshrined in constellations in Northerly skies, Cassiopeia is the most easily identifiable. 

At nine tonight Look to the Northeast and find 5 brightish stars that draw out a number “3” about the size of two fists tall, held at arm’s length.  
She hangs there midway between the horizon and the zenith.  
Yes,  You found her.

Come back five hours later.  She’s now higher in the sky, directly in the North, and has toppled over so that the “3” is now an “M.”
Yes, she’s moved!

Now come back at six in the morning and see that she’s in the Northwest.  Cassiopeia’s shifted again! Looking like an “E” or the Greek letter Sigma.  

She’s a tumbling queen to Earthbound observers, set into motion through the night by the spin of the Earth.  Her vanity, apparently punished by dizziness.  
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Recorded at Jacksonville University
Eddie Whisler | Story & Voice
Greg Minton | Audio Engineer
Tony Steve | Music
Andy Ouellette | Producer & Editor
David Smith | Logo Design
Bryan Gros | Space Art

#081 | The Tumbling Queen | Aired 10-16-20 on WJCT 89.9 FM Jacksonville

For some time now, we humans have been witnessing a revolution in astronomy, and lately we’ve been observing a golden age within that revolution.  

For example it’s been kind of a gold rush for exoplanets - planets orbiting other stars.  We’ve confirmed over four thousand of ‘em.

Amazing considering the very first was only discovered in nineteen ninety-two.  

Like a card collection increasing over time, this glut of new planets requires organization.  

Enter the Earth Similarity Index.  This measures how much like Earth a planet is: from zero point zero (not at all like Earth) to one, zero, an exact Earth analogue).  

Take a planet's radius, density, escape velocity, and surface temperature, assign likeness values, and voila.  Now we know how similar that planet is to Earth, the most coveted card.

It’s kind of like a matching game, but this index doesn’t characterize Earth’s most prized trait —habitability.  

Presumably, you’d need a water card in that index.  
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Recorded at Jacksonville University
Eddie Whisler | Story & Voice
Greg Minton | Audio Engineer
Tony Steve | Music
Andy Ouellette | Producer & Editor
David Smith | Logo Design
Bryan Gros | Space Art

#082 | Earth Similarity Index | Aired 12-4-20 on WJCT 89.9 FM Jacksonville

December 21st will treat us to “The Great Conjunction of 2020.”  The year 2020 isn’t usually associated with the word “great,” but this time we mean it.  

See, in astronomy, a conjunction is when astronomical bodies look super close to one another in our skies. Sometimes they even seem to merge.  

Jupiter and Saturn are the marks.  Follow them in the night sky these next few nights until they essentially look like one bright spark low in the western sky.  

Now, you can see it with your naked eyes, but this is a perfect opportunity to pull out a telescope.  A good telescope.  

Why?  Because on Monday you’ll be able to clearly see Jupiter adorned by colorful belts and it’s four sparkling moons AND Saturn with its rings.  ALL IN ONE SINGLE FIELD OF VIEW THROUGH THE TELESCOPE!  

So get out there and look through a lens.  And collectively we can all look up and say “GREAT!?”

Well, maybe, because you know it’ll be a cloudy night.  I mean, what do you expect?  It’s 2020.
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Recorded at Jacksonville University
Eddie Whisler | Story & Voice
Greg Minton | Audio Engineer
Tony Steve | Music
Andy Ouellette | Producer & Editor
David Smith | Logo Design
Bryan Gros | Space Imagery
Brett Jacobs | Program Title: Above and Beyond

#083 | The Great Conjunction of 2020 | Aired 12-18-20 on WJCT FM 89.9 Jacksonville

What if I told you that astronomers will place over one hundred thousand Christmas trees in the Australia Outback? 
You might ask why? 

Well, to build one of the most important instruments humans have ever built, of course.  

The “trees” are actually antennas that will be part largest radio telescope IN THE WORLD - The Square Kilometer Array.

It’s split between remote regions in Western Australia and Southern Africa.  See, the array will detect radio signals from space so we can’t have our own radio emissions interfering.  

Remote locations are key.  

Also key is the shape of the antenna, and there’s just no way around it, the low frequency-specific antennas look like 6 foot metal Christmas trees.  

The whole project seeks to push Einsteinian relativity to the limit, study the early universe further back than ever before, and do it with detail fifty times sharper than Hubble.   

By the time the project is completely finished, engineers expect around one million of these Christmas trees.  

So… Merry Christmas Science!
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Recorded at Jacksonville University
Eddie Whisler | Story & Voice
Greg Minton | Audio Engineer
Tony Steve | Music
Andy Ouellette | Producer & Editor
David Smith | Logo Design
Brett Jacobs | Program Title: Above and Beyond

#084 | Christmas Trees For Science | Aired 12-25-20 on WJCT FM 89.9 Jacksonville

As astronomers look far into the night sky with ever-increasing capabilities, the universe reveals some very bizarre places.  

Take the case of planet HD189733B.  Oh, the naming art of astronomers!    

It’s been extensively studied by a slew of different instruments and what we’ve learned is simply awesome.  

This planet is an extra-hot gas giant orbiting so close to its tempestuous parent star that flare-ups from the star are like mega blast furnaces torching the daytime side of the planet, which generate blistering winds of over five thousand miles per hour. 
That’s seven times the speed of sound.

So much atmosphere is incinerated that a long, comet-like tail has been detected stretching far away into space.  

Planets like this one, orbiting so close to their host star, moving so swiftly, and burning so hot have a special name for their orbits.  Are you ready?    “Torch orbits.”  That’s right, Torch orbits.  Now that’s a name we love.

Good job astronomers.  
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Recorded at Jacksonville University
Eddie Whisler | Story & Voice
Greg Minton | Audio Engineer
Tony Steve | Music
Andy Ouellette | Producer & Editor
David Smith | Logo Design
Brett Jacobs | Program Title: Above and Beyond

#085 | Torch Orbits | Aired 1-8-21 on WJCT FM 89.9 Jacksonville Florida

Above and Beyond... brings the universe to you, 90 seconds at a time.

Eddie Whisler, Director of the Bryan Gooding Planetarium at Jacksonville's Museum of Science & History brings you above and beyond Jacksonville's night sky to share the wonders of the universe.

Produced by Jacksonville University's The Science Of... in collaboration with the Museum of Science and History and WJCT Public Media. 

Aired on WJCT FM 89.9 during Science Friday and Radiolab.

Recorded at Jacksonville University
Eddie Whisler | Story & Voice
Greg Minton | Audio Engineer
Tony Steve | Music
Andy Ouellette | Producer & Editor
David Smith | Logo Design
Bryan Gros | Space Images
Brett Jacobs | Named "Above and Beyond"
Janel Palomo | General Assistant 2019/2020

#078 | Cassini's Grand Finale | Aired 9-11-20 on WJCT 89.9 FM Jacksonville

Jacksonville University's The Science Of...

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