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PODCAST

Walkabout the Galaxy

Joshua Colwell, Adrienne Dove, and James Cooney

An irreverent and informative tour of the latest, greatest, and most interesting discoveries in astronomy.

science natural sciences

All Episodes

48:04

Payback for Chicxulub!

Walkabout the Galaxy ·

2022/09/28

Humanity gets a bit of payback on asteroids for the rude destruction of the dinosaurs and almost all life on Earth 65 million years ago with the DART spacecraft’s successful impact on a teensy-weensy asteroid. New research suggests the asteroids teamed up on Earth long ago, and that there were at least two major impacts to end the Cretaceous and the dinosaurs. Hot and barren Mercury may have significant deposits of solid ice at its poles, and we learn about photon rings around black holes. No

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46:48

Boom: DART, Volcanoes, and Supernovae

Walkabout the Galaxy ·

2022/09/21

There are lots of explosions in this episode, beginning with the upcoming planned impact of the DART mission into a teeny-weeny asteroid to test planetary protection techniques. Then we take a look at some nifty detective work about a volcanic explosion on Mars, and finally, astronomers may have found the pre-smoking gun that lets us know when a star is about to go supernova.

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39:53

DragonCon 2022: To the Moon with Artemis and More

Walkabout the Galaxy ·

2022/09/06

The Astroquarks venture into the belly of the beast with our first live recording at the amazing DragonCon in Atlanta. Join us for a look ahead at upcoming Moon missions beyond Artemis, dragon trivia and more.

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48:57

Water Worlds at Distant Suns

Walkabout the Galaxy ·

2022/08/31

We take a journey to the Radius Valley to explore an exoplanet larger than the "Super Earths" and smaller than Neptune and Uranus. This one in particular is interesting not only because of its unusual size but also its composition appears to have a huge amount of water that may be in liquid form. We'll also check in with Up Quark Hannah Sargeant in the Artemis Corner, and cover a lot of space news and trivia.

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52:46

Ancient Astronomers and Ancient Lunar Impacts

Walkabout the Galaxy ·

2022/08/24

We return to two of our favorite topics, the red giant star Betelgeuse, and of course the Moon. Some clever historical detective work has revealed that Betelgeuse was not red, but yellow, two thousand years ago. This tells us how massive the star is and how far along it is in its evolution to a supernova. Closer to home, another clever bit of detective work gives a new history to ancient lunar craters by examining the Moon’s gravitational lumpiness. Cool!

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46:13

Strange Lightning and the Youngest Planet

Walkabout the Galaxy ·

2022/08/17

Lightning generally goes cloud to cloud or cloud to ground, but sometimes it shoots up to the ionosphere at the edge of space. We take a close look at strange lightning with lightning trivia. A baby star system in our own galaxy appears to be making a giant planet that’s less than two million years old, while the ages of distant galaxies observed by JWST are now a controversy. Catch up with us on all the latest and greatest space news and discoveries.

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45:27

Is There Something Wrong with the Standard Model?

Walkabout the Galaxy ·

2022/08/10

Korea sends its first mission to the Moon, and Mars sent a very old piece of itself to Earth. Meanwhile, the Large Hadron Collider is finding more odd collisional products than expected: the rate of creation of three W bosons is a bit high. Do you ever feel that there’s something wrong with the world? Maybe the LHC is getting a glimpse of new physics. Join us for all that, space chorizo, and the Jeans length with a full set of four astroquarks.

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48:13

The Edges of Space, the Solar System, and the Universe

Walkabout the Galaxy ·

2022/08/03

In this episode we explore clouds at the edge of space in the Earth’s upper atmosphere and discoveries of galaxies far more distant than we have seen before. We also explore why it’s so difficult to define the edge of something as ordinary as a planetary system, like our own solar system. And from that discussion is born Gravity Man and Electromagnetism Woman! Tune in to learn more!

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43:24

JWST and the Circle of Life of Stars

Walkabout the Galaxy ·

2022/07/29

We survey the initial five data releases from the JWST, from squiggly lines showing the composition of a distant planet’s atmosphere, to turbulent star forming regions, and the depths of space and time in a stunning look back toward the big bang. Join us for a geek-out session over this amazing sneak preview of what is to come in the years ahead from this reminder that humans can do cool things too.

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45:02

Fly Me to the Moon Again and Again

Walkabout the Galaxy ·

2022/07/07

We’ve had more experience flying to the Moon than you might think, and done some odd things with it, like feeding it to cockroaches. Join us for a look at the history of flights to the Moon, an interesting crater produced by space debris, and a field of rogue stars lost in intergalactic space.

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49:26

Two Odd Balls: Charon and Arrokoth

Walkabout the Galaxy ·

2022/06/29

Journey with us to the far reaches of the outer solar system where we take a closer look at two small objects explored by New Horizons: Pluto's moon Charon and the Kuiper Belt Object Arrokoth. Charon's atmosphere goes through dramatic seasonal pulses that may explain its odd, reddish polar cap, while Arrokoth has the density of a fluffy snowbank 30 km long. There's some crazy stuff out there.

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42:27

Noxious Fumes from Stars and Moons

Walkabout the Galaxy ·

2022/06/22

What does Jupiter’s volcanic moon Io have in common with one of the largest stars in the galaxy? Both are belching sulfur compounds, though for very different reasons. We learn about sulfuric outgassing on Io and the incredible hypergiant star VY Canis Majoris and its huge stellar eruptions. Plus, the European Space Agency is building a probe to hideout in space hoping to catch a passing rogue or long period comet. Join us for all that, plus space news and trivia.

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45:36

The Galactic Gamma Ray Background from Pulsars

Walkabout the Galaxy ·

2022/06/15

Pulsars are becoming the astrophysical version of big collisions for planetary scientists: they are explaining, perhaps, more and more things. Tune into this episode, where we welcome back Adam LaMee, to discuss the origin of a diffuse gamma ray glow from galactic central park as possibly due to a large population of pulsars. Also, don't forget the trivia and fake sponsors!

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53:36

Space Haboobs and Martian Haboobs

Walkabout the Galaxy ·

2022/06/01

The astroquarks talk haboobs. Unfortunately Jim is not with us to giggle, but Dr. Katariina Nykyri joins Strange and Charm to explain space weather and magnetospheric slingshots, and the Perseverance rover provides new insights into the generation of those famous Martian dust storms. Or haboobs.

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41:32

Yes MegaCon There IS a Black Hole

Walkabout the Galaxy ·

2022/05/25

Live from MegaCon 2022 in Orlando, we team up with space reporter Brendan Byrne to discuss the image of the black hole at the center of the Milky Way, great discoveries in store with JWST, and the Mars Insight lander going out with a quake, if not a bang.

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44:56

Lunar Plants and Micronovae

Walkabout the Galaxy ·

2022/05/18

A new type of nova has been confirmed. One million times fainter than a nova, these thermonuclear runaway explosions are confined to the polar regions of white dwarf stellar embers. Closer to home, researchers at the University of Florida have grown plants in lunar soil returned from the Apollo missions. Supply your own fertilizer. We have astro-historical-etymological trivia and sponsor message.

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41:54

Gravitational Redshift and Sci-Fi Body and Time Shifts

Walkabout the Galaxy ·

2022/05/11

Light gets redder as it climbs out of gravitational holes, and a star near the black hole at the center of the Milky Way conveniently demonstrates this beautifully. Join us for a discussion of gravitational redshift, a sci-fi discussion of time travel and body shifting, and a bit of Messier trivia.

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52:45

Mapping the Early Universe in HD

Walkabout the Galaxy ·

2022/05/04

As Top Quark likes to say, "You wouldn't understand: it's an early universe thing". That's why he's so excited that there's a new window into the goings on at the dawn of time by using HD. No, not high definition displays, but Hydrogen Deuteride! Oh boy, do we have fun with Deuteride on this episode. We also take a look at the crazy shuffling of planets in our own solar system, and much more.

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46:27

Planetary Decadal Survey with Almost no Uranus Jokes

Walkabout the Galaxy ·

2022/04/27

Science marches onward, and the next steps in planetary science aim towards the seventh planet from the Sun, which shall not be named, and Saturn's little moon with a big ocean, Enceladus. Join us for a review of the new directions for planetary science research in the next decade, space news, and Uranus trivia.

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50:42

The Cosmic Significance of Tiny Things

Walkabout the Galaxy ·

2022/04/20

Tiny fragments of the dinosaur-killing asteroid may have been found, preserved in amber, and new analysis of old data reveals a tiny, but potentially profound error in the mass of one of the fundamental particles, the W boson. It's not all small, as we also take a look at the largest comet nucleus and the most powerful laser.

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