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CBC
4 days ago
- Science
- CBC
Jul 26: The Annual Quirks & Quarks Holiday Question Show
Originally published on Jan. 4, 2025 Our holiday gifts to our listeners are answers for all their wacky but fascinating science questions, like: Genevieve Willis from London ON asks: Is there any evidence to suggest that "getting cold" by, say, dressing inadequately in cold weather, or sitting in a cold draft, actually increases our susceptibility to illness? For the frigid answer, we spoke with Michael Kennedy who is an associate professor of exercise physiology at the University of Alberta. Jim Raso from St. Albert AB wrote us: As I have gotten older—I am 73 now—I notice that time seemed to pass more quickly. Why does this happen? For the answer, we asked Holly K. Andersen, a professor of philosophy at Simon Fraser University in Burnaby, British Columbia. Dan from Chateau-Richer QB writes: Where does moon dust come from? We reached out to planetary geologist Gordon Osinski, a professor of Earth Sciences at Western University, who has studied samples sent back from the Apollo missions. Scott Beach from East York ON asks: Why do dogs sniff and lick each other's butts? To get the answer, we reached out to Simon Gadbois, the principal investigator at the Canine olfaction lab at Dalhousie University. Robert Smith from Victoria BC asks: Is there evidence to suggest red-heads are particularly sensitive to pain? To find out, we spoke with someone who has studied this in the past: Jeffrey Mogil, the E.P. Taylor Professor of Pain Studies at the Alan Edwards Centre for Research on Pain at McGill University. Stephen Quinn from St. John's NF asks: How can the universe be expanding at the same time as galaxies are colliding? For the smashing answer, we spoke with Sara Ellison, a professor of physics and astronomy at the University of Victoria. Susan Boyd from Ottawa ON asks: Since some of the elements in the periodic table do not occur naturally, is there a limit to the new elements that could be created? We went to the National Research Council Canada's element expert, Juris Meija, for this answer. Robert LaRoche in Halifax NS asks: Why is the colour of wet clothes always more vivid than when they are dry? For the answer, we turned to Sarah Purdy, a Physicist at the University of Saskatchewan who uses light to investigate materials. Paul Vander Griendt of Newmarket ON asks: If animals wake up at sunrise and go to sleep at sunset, how do they cope with the varying hours of sunlight? For the answer we turned to Ming Fei Li a Phd candidate at the University of Toronto in Anthropology who is studying the sleep patterns of animals. Marie Beaudoin from Salt Spring Island BC asks: How do birds where the males and females look the same tell each other apart when it comes to mating?" We went to Matt Reudinik, a professor of biology at Thompson Rivers University in Kamloops, BC, for the answer. Warren Saylor of London ON asks: Could Neanderthals speak? If they could not, would that contribute to the dominance of Homo Sapiens? We spoke to paleoanthropologist Bence Viola, an associate professor in the department of Anthropology at the University of Toronto.
The National
20-07-2025
- Politics
- The National
From Apollo 11 to Artemis: Why Nasa's legacy is under threat
Fifty-six years after Neil Armstrong 's historic first step on the Moon, Nasa is leading the drive to send astronauts to the lunar surface once more, though it is feared at the expense of its own scientific programmes. The agency is marking Moon Day on July 20, the anniversary of the famous Apollo 11 landing, as it navigates a period of transition without a Senate-confirmed administrator. While US President Donald Trump's 'Big Beautiful Bill' secures funding for Artemis, Nasa's flagship Moon exploration programme, the White House spending plan slashes the budget for the agency's Earth science, astrophysics and planetary research divisions by nearly half. Scientists and space policy experts told The National that the US is sacrificing some of its most ambitious scientific projects to keep the lunar return on track. Dr Gordon Osinski, an Earth sciences professor at the Western University in Ontario, Canada, and a geology team member for Artemis III, said he is concerned about the long-term effect these cuts could have. 'While Artemis II appears to be on schedule for a spring 2026 launch, I am concerned about US budget cuts, the big exodus of senior Nasa employees and what this means for returning humans to the surface of the Moon in the Artemis III mission,' he said. Some Nasa employees are set to hold a protest on Moon Day in Washington DC in a bid to save the agency's science divisions. "We're fighting for science, engineering and exploration," the protest website reads. "Tell Congress to push back on the 2025 Presidential Budget Request that cuts Nasa science by 47 per cent, Stem education by 100 per cent, and Nasa's full budget by 25 per cent." Artemis boost but science takes hit The Trump administration has made crewed exploration a centrepiece of its space agenda. The 'Big Beautiful Bill', signed into law on July 4, features billions of dollars in additional funding for the Space Launch System, Orion capsule and Lunar Gateway projects. But the White House's proposed budget cuts would reshape programmes in favour of crewed exploration, slashing funding for climate monitoring satellites, planetary missions such as the Mars Sample Return and major space telescopes in development. Dr Dimitra Atri, scientist at NYUAD, said current space policy lacks the clarity and consistency that helped propel the Apollo missions. 'The public's relationship with space exploration has changed dramatically since Apollo's collective wonder in 1969,' he said. 'Today's achievements, while technically sophisticated, struggle to capture that same imagination, especially when delays and setbacks dominate headlines. 'Apollo went from [US president John F] Kennedy's 1961 announcement to lunar landing in eight years, while Artemis has spent over a decade working to return astronauts to lunar orbit, something we accomplished 50 years ago with far less capabilities.' Nasa has been a global leader in explorative space science for decades, responsible for some of the most ground-breaking missions in history. The Hubble Space Telescope, for example, revolutionised astronomy by capturing deep-space images that reshaped our understanding of the universe. Nasa's fleet of Mars rovers, including Spirit, Opportunity, Curiosity and Perseverance, uncovered evidence of past water activity and potential habitability on the Red Planet. The James Webb Space Telescope, launched in 2021, is offering unprecedented views of the early universe and distant exoplanets. On Earth, the Terra and Aqua satellites have played a key role in monitoring climate change. Rising global competition While Nasa deals with the reshaping of its programmes, other countries are making steady progress with their Moon plans and scientific space missions. China completed the first lunar far side sample return with its Chang'e-6 mission and is planning a crewed Moon landing before 2030. Fifty-four countries are part of the US-led Artemis Accords, an international agreement on peaceful and transparent lunar exploration. Dr Osinski said Moon Day should remind the world of the value of international co-operation and science-driven exploration. 'Moon Day is an excellent way to focus the world's attention on the past, present and future of lunar exploration,' he said. 'While its date is based on the first US landing on the surface of the Moon, it has grown to represent much more than this and to be a global celebration. 'International collaboration is key to space exploration and so Moon Day can provide some sorely needed inspiration and an example of the good that can come about when countries work with each other, not against.' Shift to commercial space Nasa's increasing reliance on commercial partners is also shaping how it now approaches exploration. SpaceX's Starship is central to Artemis III's landing plan and Axiom Space is developing the new generation of lunar spacesuits. Dave Barnhart, chief executive of California space infrastructure company Arkisys, said the rise of commercial space is a natural evolution, one that can benefit science in the long run. 'Nasa was the pioneer to create the environment for commercial cargo to the ISS, which is now leading to development of commercial space stations,' he said. 'Likewise, they contracted several companies to lead new vehicle development and test flights to the Moon, which has encouraged true investment.' He said that even if Nasa's scientific leadership weakens in the short term, global and private-sector collaboration could generate even greater returns. 'We are going to gain far more than just what one government organisation could apply to the problems,' he said.
Yahoo
18-03-2025
- Science
- Yahoo
Killer space rocks
When you buy through links on our articles, Future and its syndication partners may earn a commission. It was from a football field–size asteroid designated 2024 YR4. Detected in December by a telescope in Chile, the space rock was flagged for its size—it's 130 to 300 feet long, big enough to wipe out a city—and a trajectory that put it on track to possibly hit Earth on Dec. 22, 2032. NASA initially put the chance of an impact at 1.2 percent. The odds soon jumped to 3.1 percent, or 1 in 32, a record high for an asteroid of its size. But after closer study of the asteroid's orbit, the threat of a hit was downgraded to a negligible 0.004 percent. While humanity's plans for the 2032 holidays are safe, the scare highlighted a threat that scientists say urgently needs more focus: the millions of giant rocks that are hurtling through space, some of which may be on collision courses with our planet. 'Take it as a warning shot across our bow,' said astrophysicist Neil DeGrasse Tyson. 'These things are out there.' NASA's Center for Near Earth Object Studies (CNEOS) tracks more than 37,000 asteroids whose trajectories approach Earth's orbit. Most are the size of a car or smaller and pose no risk, because they will burn up in our atmosphere. On the opposite end of the spectrum are 'planet killers': asteroids a kilometer or more across that could potentially wipe out civilization. About 900 have been identified. In between are a range of potential threats. A 160-foot-wide asteroid could destroy a major metropolitan area; those are thought to strike once every 1,000 years. A 500-foot- wide space rock could inflict mass casualties across a state or a small country; those arrive every 20,000 years. Of course, 'these numbers are very approximate,' said planetary geologist Gordon Osinski, 'and they don't really help us figure out when the next one might happen.' On Feb. 15, 2013, a roughly 60-foot-wide asteroid entered the atmosphere and exploded 19 miles above the Russian city of Chelyabinsk. It set off a blinding flash and a shock wave that damaged more than 7,000 buildings over 200 square miles, and injured more than 1,600 people, many of them hit by shattered glass. The light from the blast was like 'the end of the world,' said Valentina Nikolayeva, a teacher. In 1908, a 130-foot-wide asteroid or comet—the latter is an icy ball of dust and rock—exploded 6 miles above a remote stretch of Siberia, releasing 185 times more energy than the atomic bomb dropped on Hiroshima. Some 800 square miles of forest were leveled in the so-called Tunguska event. Still, that space rock was a pebble compared with the one that wiped out the dinosaurs 66 million years ago. There's no current fear of anything of that magnitude hitting Earth, but other Tunguska-size threats are out there. Possibly. But first we have to see them coming. In 2005, Congress directed NASA to find and track, by 2020, 90 percent of near-Earth objects—asteroids or comets that come within 30 million miles of our planet's orbit— 460 feet or larger. Right now 'we're at something like 45 percent,' said CNEOS director Paul Chodas. NASA has built a network of telescopes, including the one in Chile that detected 2024 YR4, to identify threats. An infrared space telescope, NEO Surveyor, that will further boost detection is scheduled for launch in 2027. When a new object is found, information is shared with a global web of space agencies and observatories that go to work determining its shape, size, and orbital path. If one is judged to be headed for Earth, the next task is to try to alter its path—something NASA recently proved feasible. In 2022, it launched the golf cart–size Double Asteroid Redirection Test (DART) spacecraft, which slammed into Dimorphos, a 530- foot asteroid, at 14,000 miles per hour. The collision successfully altered the projectile's orbit. Researchers are also studying the use of a 'gravitational tractor,' a spacecraft that would orbit alongside an asteroid, exerting gravitational pull that would gradually alter the rock's course. All these efforts require years of advance planning and may not be effective against a giant asteroid. If a space rock is too large for deflection—or due to hit with relatively short notice— humanity would need to use a nuclear bomb to deflect or vaporize it. A 2021 study showed that a 1-megaton nuke launched at least two months before impact could annihilate a 330-foot asteroid. But setting off a nuke in space is no small matter. It 'could be very awkward geopolitically,' said Robin George Andrews, author of How to Kill an Asteroid. It's just one example of how asteroid response requires a globally coordinated effort. We're making progress. The Chelyabinsk explosion led to the creation of NASA's Planetary Defense Coordination Office, designed in part to link efforts with other groups such as the U.N.-sponsored International Asteroid Warning Network. And last year for the first time, international representatives attended NASA's biennial Planetary Defense Interagency Tabletop Exercise, which gamed out the discovery of a massive asteroid with a 72 percent chance of impacting Earth in 2038. Scientists say this cooperation is a step in the right direction, but that many questions remain around a potential global asteroid defense. What's the best approach? Who would be in charge? 'Asteroid impacts are one of the few natural disasters that we actually have the means to both foresee and prevent,' said NASA aerospace engineer Brent Barbee. We must be 'as prepared as possible.' Some 66 million years ago, an asteroid at least 6 miles wide slammed into Mexico's Yucatan Peninsula. Digging a crater 125 miles wide, it triggered earthquakes and tsunamis, and firestorms that may have spanned the globe. Gas, soot, and dust blanketed the planet, blotting out the sun and sending global temperatures plummeting. That extinction event wiped out 75 percent of life on Earth—including the dinosaurs. But some experts believe the impact would have been far less calamitous if the rock had landed elsewhere. A 2017 study concluded that the asteroid struck a spot unusually rich in organic sediment, which worsened the blackout effect. The dinosaurs might have survived if not for that happenstance, the researchers believe, and the rise of the mammals—including humans— might never have occurred. 'This is maybe a lucky coincidence that everything came into place like it is today,' said geochemist Mario Fischer-Gödde.
