2015

SUnknownUnsolved Mystery in Physics: Fast Radio Bursts

Tue, Oct 23, 2018

As of this release 'fast radio bursts' are one of the latest mysteries in cosmology. It is expected these high energy, millisecond long radio pulses are associated with events on compact, highly magnetized objects such as magentars or the MIlky Way's central black hole. Relatively few are know at present though archival searches are expanding the pool greatly.

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SUnknownUnsolved Mystery in Physics | Direct Collapse Black Holes

Tue, Dec 11, 2018

The discover of on 800 million solar mass black hotel that formed less than a billion years after the big bang suggested a massive cloud of gas collapsed directly into a a black hole never producing stars.

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SUnknownHow Did Saturn's Hexagonal Polar Vortex form?!: Space is Weird

Tue, Feb 12, 2019

Planetary polar storms are the norm rather than exception. Earth has one over Antarctica. Saturn has two but the storm at the north pole is strangely shaped like a regular hexagon. The best thinking is that it is a standing wave caused by differing wind speeds on either side of the hexagon. The gradient is perfect to create a hexagon. The same effect was created in the laboratory along with a number of other regular polygons depending on the size of the gradient.

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SUnknownDo black holes contain dark matter?

Tue, Mar 19, 2019

Intuitively dark matter should be pulled into a black hole. But the mechanism by which black holes accrete normal matter does not seem to apply to dark matter,

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SUnknownWhy do stars form inside dusty blobs? | Space Is Weird - Bok Globules

Tue, Apr 30, 2019

Bok Globules are dust clouds where stars are formed but proving that was notoriously challenging.

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SUnknownWhat's the probability that two stars collide when galaxies collide? with equations!

Tue, May 07, 2019

THere's lots and lots of space between stars. So prepare for lots of decimal places when calculating the likelihood of stars colliding in a galaxy merger.

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SUnknownThe Cartwheel Galaxy | Space is Weird

Tue, Jul 30, 2019

Apart from their beauty, the bright clusters in the ring of the Cartwheel Galaxy have drawn the interest of astronomers as potential locations of the long sought intermediate black hole.

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SUnknownAn Astrophysicist's Top 10 Unsolved Mysteries

Tue, May 12, 2020

Becky shares ten common questions asked of her and favorites of her own. They all turn out to have a very dark theme involving dark energy, dark matter, the big bang and, of course, Becky's favorite, black holes. Spoiler alert: the answer to all the questions is 'we don't know'. Not yet anyway.

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SUnknownGalactic Cannibalism in NGC 474: Space is Weird

Wed, Sep 02, 2020

NGC-474 looks like a huge shell galaxy but with star trails on its outskirts and a big spiral galaxy, NGC-240, hanging around watching. Becky thinks it's a fossil of a group of galaxies that all merged together except the one remaining spiral which may be set to join the rest soon.

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SUnknownAn astrophysicist watches 'Star Trek: The Next Generation' for the first time

Wed, Nov 25, 2020

Critics, and enthusiasts, have been pointing out Star Trek's foibles for six or is it seven generations. So why shouldn't an astrophysicist take a moment to comment. Dr. Becky spots some sound and interesting physics that she explains, some errors that are better understood in the thirty years since the series aired, and a couple really odd things with no basis in reality.

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SUnknownHow we plan to solve the "Crisis in Cosmology"

Wed, Feb 24, 2021

The Hubble constant is the rate of expansion of the universe. Unfortunatly, the value measured using red shifts and the theoretical value from the best cosmological model don't agree. Not even close. That is the crisis in cosmology. Fortunately a method of measuring the constant using gravity wave detectors has emerged on the scene. Once enough neutron star mergers have been observed cosmologists hope to know which Hubble constant is correct.

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SUnknownAn astrophysicist reacts to Carl Sagan's Contact

Wed, Mar 03, 2021

Dr. Becky has a few pretty serious technical issues with Contact but truly enjoyed it. Some of her reactions are rather emotional ranging from shock and outrage to sentimentality and curiosity. She shares some real world parallels to some of the events in the film.

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SUnknownAn Astrophysicist reacts to The Expanse

Wed, May 05, 2021

Becky's commentary on The Expanse is overall positive. She sees accurate attention to detail in ways most people wouldn't think of. There are even a couple technologies that stumped her until she did a web search for an explanation. There is also a human physiology concept backed up by real data.

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SUnknownWhy you should believe the HYPE for the James Webb Space Telescope

Wed, May 26, 2021

Becky is excited, really, about the James Webb Telescope. It is an infrared telescope with a huge 6.5 meter mirror that will be ideal for looking at the composition of exoplanet atmospheres and newly formed stars within dust clouds. Ironically, due to the red-shift of distant galaxies, The telescope will be able to produce optical images of galaxies the Hubble telescope couldn't see.

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SUnknownIn conversation with Dr Sarah Kendrew (Astronomer and Instrument Scientists ESA)

Sat, May 29, 2021

Becky interviews Sarah Kendrew who is working on the mid-infrared instrument on the James Web Space Telescope. Sarah expects the instrument to be capable of determining the composition of exoplanet atmospheres and peering into dusty galaxies to see what kinds of stars are forming.

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SUnknownDark matter: smooth or clumpy?! The Dark Energy Survey Results!

Wed, Jun 02, 2021

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SUnknownIn conversation with Dr Alexandra Amon Dark Energy Survey & Stanford University

Sat, Jun 05, 2021

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SUnknownWhat's 'inside' a black hole?

Wed, Jun 09, 2021

Becky begins by dispelling a few myths and misconceptions about black holes. Then she presents a few basics about light. escape velocity and everyone's favorite general relativity. No we can tackle three possibilities; a singularity, exotic matter or still don't know.

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SUnknownWas the Big Bang a WHITE hole?

Wed, Sep 22, 2021

Following a quick review of what black holes and white holes are, Dr. Becky explains the subtle sounding but radical difference between a white hole and the big bang.

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SUnknownWhy can't LIGO detect mergers of supermassive black holes?

Wed, Oct 27, 2021

The LIGO uses interferometry to detect gravitation waves that stretch space and hence the arms of the detector by different amounts. The 4 km length of the detector arms give the observatory that ability to detect fairly short gravitational waves whereas collisions of super massive black holes generate much longer waves.

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SUnknownAn astrophysicist's TOP 5 targets for JWST

Wed, May 04, 2022

Dr. Becky is incredibly excited about the James Webb Space Telescope. So naturally she has some favorite targets. But they are surprisingly diverse.

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SUnknownAn astrophysicist's live reaction to the first JWST science images

Mon, Jul 11, 2022

Dr. Becky expresses the awe experienced by all astrophysicists at seeing the incredible detail of the first images and spectra from the James Web Space Telescope. Images include: SMACS 0723 galaxy cluster with substantial gravitational lensing, the atmospheric spectra of planet Wasp 96b, Southern Ring 'planetary' Nebula and its central binary star, Stephan's Quintet interacting galaxy group and the star form region of the Carina Nebula .

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SUnknownAn astrophysicist explains JWST's Cartwheel Galaxy image

Wed, Aug 10, 2022

Dr. Becky responds to questions about the new JWST's new infrared astrophotograph of the double ring galaxy know as the Cartwheel.

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SUnknownJWST's Successor: The Carl Sagan Observatory - a 12 Metre Optical Telescope Searching for Exo-Earth

Wed, Nov 16, 2022

A proposal for a visible light space telescope dubbed Carl Sagan for optically imaging exo-planets is circulating hoping to capitalize on the knowledge base of the engineers who build the James Webb space telescope.

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SUnknownJWST Discovered Photochemistry in an Exoplanet's Atmosphere (this is a Bid Deal) ft. Dr. Jake Taylor

Wed, Nov 30, 2022

Dr. Becky talks with the astrophysicist involved in analyzing the JWST spectrum of the exoplanet Wasp 39B to find volcanic hydrogen sulfide being converted to sulfur dioxide by light form its parent star.

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SUnknownThe Euclid Space Telescope: tackling dark matter and dark energy mysteries

Wed, Jun 21, 2023

The Euclid Space Telescope is a survey telescope that will survey the sky that is not obscured by dust, roughly one third of the sky. It will also take a long look at a small patch. The goal is to better understand galaxy evolution, the distribution of dark matter and the expansion rate of the universe.

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SUnknownAstrophysicist explains big GRAVITATIONAL WAVE discovery! Are they NEW PHYSICS or merging SMBHs?

Wed, Jul 05, 2023

Astronmers have devised a method, called a pulsar timing array, using pulsars to detect extremely long gravitational waves. The gravitational waves are light years long so they take decades to observe.

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SUnknownHas JWST shown the Universe is TWICE as old as we think?!

Wed, Jul 26, 2023

A 2023 paper resurrects Fritz Zwicky's hypothesis known as "Tiered Light" and combines it with the lambda cold dark matter model to explain the super massive black holes and large galaxies detected in the early universe by the James Webb Space Telescope. This work calculates an age of the universe that is double the currently accepted value.

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SUnknownThe Horizon Problem | The Universe's biggest UNSOLVED mystery

Wed, Feb 14, 2024

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SUnknownWOW! Incredible new JWST images of 19 galaxies | Night Sky News February 2024

Wed, Feb 21, 2024

Becky's February 2024 edition of "Night Sky News' features her sky observers almanac, new telescopes, interplanetary exploration, new JWST galaxies and, alas, an obituary.

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SUnknownHow do we know how much dark matter there is in the Universe?

Fri, Mar 08, 2024

Dark matter is matter that responds to, and causes, gravity but not electromagnetism, e.g. light, which is why it is dark. Even though it can't be seen cosmologists have measured how much there is is several very different ways and, remarkably, all the methods agree.

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SUnknownCan gravitational waves Interfere with each other?

Wed, Mar 13, 2024

Investigating a viewer's question about gravitational wave interference, Becky found there is indeed evidence that gravitational waves interfere just like every other wave we know of. Then she shares the implications for quantum gravity.

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SUnknownThe first evidence for PLUNGING REGIONS around black holes (Einstein was right!) ft. Dr Andy Mummery

Wed, May 29, 2024

The plunging region is a theoretical area between the stable orbits and event horizon of a spinning black hole. Analysis of recent data from a nearby black hole offers the first evidence that this region actually exists.

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SUnknownThe Roman Space Telescope - NASA's next generation observatory

Wed, Jun 12, 2024

Nancy Grace Roman was NASA's first chief of its astronomy program. She was a great proponent of the Hubble Space so its only appropriate that the follow-on telescope to Hubble, the Roman Space Telescope, would be named after her.

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