WEBVTT - What does the NICER telescope study? 0:00:08.720 --> 0:00:13.960 Hey, Daniel, have physicists gotten any better at naming their experiments? Well, 0:00:14.040 --> 0:00:17.639 let's check in. Here's a paper by the ASK CAP 0:00:17.840 --> 0:00:22.920 Rotation Measure and Polarization Investigation Team, also known as ARMPIT. 0:00:24.920 --> 0:00:26.680 I don't know what the best part of that is? 0:00:26.680 --> 0:00:30.640 Is the ask CAP or the arm PIT. There's also 0:00:30.760 --> 0:00:37.720 the background Imaging of Cosmic extra galactric Polarization or bicep alright, 0:00:37.960 --> 0:00:42.280 a mothly acronym. Well, if you're not into the aggressive ones, 0:00:42.320 --> 0:00:46.720 then you won't like the balloon born Large Aperture submillimeter 0:00:46.840 --> 0:00:50.880 telescope or last. Oh nice, although technically that one should 0:00:50.920 --> 0:00:55.840 be blast balloon born. Guest need more? You know, positive, 0:00:55.960 --> 0:00:59.200 upbeat science names. Well, then, what do you think of 0:00:59.200 --> 0:01:04.920 the project called Super Huge Interferometric Telescope or s H 0:01:05.040 --> 0:01:10.080 I T It sounds like a crappy title. What is it? 0:01:10.160 --> 0:01:28.240 Study dark Matter? I am Pammy, cartoonist and the creator 0:01:28.319 --> 0:01:31.839 of PhD comics. Hi, I'm Daniel. I'm a particle physicist 0:01:31.840 --> 0:01:34.920 and a professor at U c Irvine, and I'm definitely 0:01:34.959 --> 0:01:37.560 not an astronomer. Why not, Daniel not a fan of 0:01:37.600 --> 0:01:39.679 the stars. I love the stars and I love the 0:01:39.760 --> 0:01:42.240 mysteries of the universe. And I am a professor in 0:01:42.280 --> 0:01:46.000 the physics and astronomy department, so I sometimes get emails 0:01:46.000 --> 0:01:47.960 that address me as an astronomer, and I wonder what 0:01:48.000 --> 0:01:51.440 the real astronomers in my department would think about that. Well, 0:01:51.440 --> 0:01:54.440 it's an interesting distinction, right, It's called physics and astronomy. 0:01:54.440 --> 0:01:57.040 It's astronomy, not part of physics. You have hit on 0:01:57.080 --> 0:02:01.520 an existential question for astronomers that see them struggling with 0:02:01.680 --> 0:02:05.040 every single day. Really they don't know, Wow, they don't 0:02:05.080 --> 0:02:08.800 consider themselves physicists. I hesitate to speak for the astronomers 0:02:08.840 --> 0:02:10.679 out there, but I definitely know that they feel like 0:02:10.720 --> 0:02:13.440 a different community. You know. It's a different set of skills, 0:02:13.480 --> 0:02:16.720 a different set of questions, a different set of ideas, 0:02:17.080 --> 0:02:19.840 and also like a different set of classes that astronomy 0:02:19.840 --> 0:02:23.280 students and physics students take. Interesting, but fundamentally, you were 0:02:23.320 --> 0:02:26.160 both trying to study how things work out there in 0:02:26.160 --> 0:02:28.600 the universe, right, Yeah, But I guess all scientists are 0:02:28.720 --> 0:02:31.720 right from that point of view, chemists are physicists, biologists 0:02:31.800 --> 0:02:38.320 or physicists, but our physicists chemists only physical chemists. Welcome 0:02:38.320 --> 0:02:40.720 to our podcast. Daniel and Jorge explain the Universe a 0:02:40.800 --> 0:02:44.040 production of I Heart Radio in which we believe everybody's 0:02:44.080 --> 0:02:47.040 a physicist, even the chemists and the biologists and maybe 0:02:47.040 --> 0:02:50.639 even the sociologists, because we all want to understand how 0:02:50.680 --> 0:02:53.720 the universe works. We want to apply our tools, the 0:02:53.760 --> 0:02:55.720 eyeballs that are in our head and the eyeballs that 0:02:55.760 --> 0:02:58.799 we can build, to answer the deepest questions about the 0:02:58.880 --> 0:03:02.240 nature of the universe. What is out there on those 0:03:02.240 --> 0:03:05.760 other planets, surrounding those other weird stars, in those other 0:03:05.840 --> 0:03:08.640 swirling galaxies, and what can it tell us about the 0:03:08.720 --> 0:03:11.200 nature of the universe we live in, where it came from, 0:03:11.360 --> 0:03:13.720 and how it will all end. Yeah, it is a 0:03:13.800 --> 0:03:17.480 swirly universe full of amazing facts and incredible objects out 0:03:17.480 --> 0:03:19.880 there doing incredible things that we just want to know 0:03:20.000 --> 0:03:22.560 more about. Every time we look at into the universe, 0:03:22.600 --> 0:03:25.800 we discover something new and weird, because the universe is 0:03:26.040 --> 0:03:29.120 stranger than fiction. When you think you understood something and 0:03:29.160 --> 0:03:31.679 you point your telescope about it justice sort of double check, 0:03:31.960 --> 0:03:35.840 you find something bizarre, like the Fermi bubbles or astrophysical jets, 0:03:35.960 --> 0:03:39.240 or neutron stars or pulsars, or any other sort of 0:03:39.280 --> 0:03:42.200 weird surprise that nature has in store. For us. Yeah, 0:03:42.240 --> 0:03:45.000 it does all sound like basketball teams. Dan, is there 0:03:45.040 --> 0:03:48.840 like an intramural physics department league? That's right. You've gotta 0:03:48.840 --> 0:03:52.800 be able to dunk to get on the astrophysical Jets team. Know, 0:03:52.840 --> 0:03:54.440 there's not a whole lot of dunking going on in 0:03:54.440 --> 0:03:58.840 the physics league. I gotta be honest, only donuts on coffee. Yeah, 0:03:58.960 --> 0:04:01.640 more sort of like Twitter dunking than actual physics dounking. 0:04:01.760 --> 0:04:03.400 But that's right. We all want to know. We're all 0:04:03.440 --> 0:04:06.880 scientists in a way. Everyone has curiosity and questions about 0:04:06.880 --> 0:04:09.480 the universe, and just asking the questions sort of kind 0:04:09.480 --> 0:04:12.040 of qualifies you as a scientist, doesn't it. Yeah, everybody 0:04:12.040 --> 0:04:15.040 out there is doing science. If you're asking questions about 0:04:15.040 --> 0:04:18.040 the universe, remember that science is not some weird institution 0:04:18.320 --> 0:04:20.479 in a tall building somewhere. It's just a bunch of 0:04:20.480 --> 0:04:24.000 people asking questions about how the universe works and deciding 0:04:24.040 --> 0:04:28.080 to dedicate their lives to answering one particular question about 0:04:28.080 --> 0:04:31.040 the universe. So if you have a question that's burning 0:04:31.080 --> 0:04:33.680 deep inside you about the way the universe works, then 0:04:33.680 --> 0:04:38.440 maybe you can help push forward the envelope of human knowledge. Yeah, maybe, 0:04:38.440 --> 0:04:41.960 like maybe your department should just be called the science department, right, 0:04:43.200 --> 0:04:45.440 or I guess you're all, you know, a science part 0:04:45.440 --> 0:04:47.479 of being humans, So maybe you should just be the 0:04:47.600 --> 0:04:51.320 human Department. The department that sounds like a John Grisham 0:04:51.360 --> 0:04:55.560 novel about science department gone bad, Daniel, you could be 0:04:55.560 --> 0:04:58.480 the John Grisham of physics. You could write thriller novels 0:04:59.279 --> 0:05:03.120 about his conspiracies. We don't tenure anyone, We just take 0:05:03.200 --> 0:05:07.440 ten years to chew them up. There you go, that's 0:05:07.480 --> 0:05:12.160 the tagline for the for your debut, Noveum. That's right, Netflix, 0:05:12.360 --> 0:05:14.360 right to me? Please we joke. But that's a little 0:05:14.400 --> 0:05:16.560 bit the history of science, right. It all started out 0:05:16.560 --> 0:05:19.719 as philosophy, and then when a question becomes sort of 0:05:19.760 --> 0:05:22.520 well enough formed for people to do, experimented buds off 0:05:22.560 --> 0:05:25.400 into its own area of science, and then it splits 0:05:25.440 --> 0:05:28.159 further and further into sub areas. And joke with my 0:05:28.200 --> 0:05:30.279 wife a lot, because while the physics department is the 0:05:30.279 --> 0:05:33.279 biggest department on our campus and on many campuses, that's 0:05:33.279 --> 0:05:36.920 only because they're like nine different biology departments. So all 0:05:36.960 --> 0:05:39.520 in all, these like ten times as many biologists as 0:05:39.520 --> 0:05:42.640 physicists on campus. If only they knew you could put 0:05:42.680 --> 0:05:45.839 this all the names in one department title, you know, 0:05:45.920 --> 0:05:49.599 like physics and astronomy. Yeah, exactly. Or I guess you know, 0:05:49.760 --> 0:05:51.919 we're all part of the universe, so really should just 0:05:51.960 --> 0:05:56.680 be the universe department, or maybe like the university. Is 0:05:56.680 --> 0:05:58.919 that where that name comes from? I have no idea 0:05:58.960 --> 0:06:02.080 actually where the word university comes from. May it's an acronym. 0:06:03.600 --> 0:06:14.680 It stands for a university hit internally versus I ran 0:06:14.720 --> 0:06:18.800 out a steam hapway through. Yeah, it's train is resources, research, 0:06:19.720 --> 0:06:25.320 science and engineering. Damn, we almost got there. We almost 0:06:25.320 --> 0:06:27.480 got there. But it is a pretty wonderful universe, full 0:06:27.480 --> 0:06:30.560 of things to think about and to wonder about, including 0:06:30.600 --> 0:06:33.440 all of the amazing light and information that's out there 0:06:33.480 --> 0:06:36.279 for us to see. Exactly. While so much of the 0:06:36.400 --> 0:06:39.440 universe is incredible and beautiful just in the visible light 0:06:39.520 --> 0:06:41.680 that our eyes can see, we also know that the 0:06:41.720 --> 0:06:44.919 universe looks quite different in other kinds of light, in 0:06:45.040 --> 0:06:47.960 light where the wavelengths are too long for our eyes 0:06:48.000 --> 0:06:51.760 to see, radio and infrared, and also in very high 0:06:52.000 --> 0:06:55.160 energy photons that are above our visible spectrum, in the 0:06:55.240 --> 0:06:58.320 ultra violet and deep into the X ray. Yeah, because 0:06:58.400 --> 0:07:00.440 humans have a sort of a very limited view of 0:07:00.440 --> 0:07:02.360 what we can see out there with light, and it's 0:07:02.360 --> 0:07:04.680 almost like the universe isn't just there for us. It's 0:07:04.680 --> 0:07:06.840 doing all kinds of things in other parts of the 0:07:06.920 --> 0:07:09.760 light spectrum, just the same way your doctor can see 0:07:09.880 --> 0:07:13.200 very different things about your body using X rays which 0:07:13.240 --> 0:07:16.440 passed through all the soft tissue and reveal the location 0:07:16.520 --> 0:07:19.200 of the bones that they came using visible light just 0:07:19.240 --> 0:07:22.840 by looking on the outside. Astronomers can also X ray 0:07:22.920 --> 0:07:26.200 the universe by looking at the X ray photons that 0:07:26.360 --> 0:07:28.840 arrive here on Earth. Yeah, do they have special like 0:07:29.000 --> 0:07:31.760 X ray glasses how you can order from the back 0:07:31.800 --> 0:07:33.840 of comic books. You want to see through the close 0:07:33.880 --> 0:07:38.520 of astronomers. Is that what's going on? Yeah, you woul't 0:07:38.560 --> 0:07:41.920 like what you see. Probably not all those donuts, not 0:07:41.960 --> 0:07:44.640 a lot of biceps. But we do have very special 0:07:44.840 --> 0:07:48.240 X ray eyeballs that we have built. Since our eyeballs 0:07:48.280 --> 0:07:50.920 can't see X ray light, we had to develop special 0:07:50.960 --> 0:07:54.920 technology to focus, to shape, to detect these X ray 0:07:54.920 --> 0:07:57.960 photons and to use them to answer deep questions about 0:07:58.000 --> 0:08:00.640 what's out there in the universe. You make it sound 0:08:00.640 --> 0:08:04.200 like astronomers have like special implants in their eyeballs that 0:08:04.320 --> 0:08:07.200 give them x ray vision. That's the future man, right. 0:08:07.360 --> 0:08:10.160 Just Step one is build a big device that weighs 0:08:10.160 --> 0:08:12.560 like a ton and sits outside your body, and eventually 0:08:12.640 --> 0:08:15.320 you miniaturize it and implant it right in the brain. Well, 0:08:15.400 --> 0:08:17.960 step wants to get your own department, and then you 0:08:17.960 --> 0:08:19.800 can order that kind of stuff. That's the goal. I 0:08:19.840 --> 0:08:23.520 just want the department of Daniel. There you go, and 0:08:23.600 --> 0:08:27.720 your subject matter is just whatever I want. Maybe actually 0:08:27.760 --> 0:08:29.200 the rest of the department wants me to have my 0:08:29.240 --> 0:08:31.200 own department. I'm gonna get kicked out. You could be 0:08:31.240 --> 0:08:33.800 the chair of your own department. You have just a 0:08:33.920 --> 0:08:36.880 chair and be the chair. There should be some adage 0:08:36.920 --> 0:08:39.120 like he who has himself his department chair has a 0:08:39.120 --> 0:08:42.040 fool for a faculty member. But anyways, there is a 0:08:42.040 --> 0:08:44.840 lot of incredible stuff happening out there in the universe 0:08:44.880 --> 0:08:47.439 in the X ray spectrum. It's not just good for 0:08:47.559 --> 0:08:50.280 looking at your bones or your teeth. Uh. There are 0:08:50.320 --> 0:08:54.480 also incredible things happening in stars and neutron stars and 0:08:54.600 --> 0:08:57.040 pulsars out there, and even black holes that we could 0:08:57.120 --> 0:08:59.840 learn if we can see better in this part of 0:08:59.840 --> 0:09:03.280 the spectrum. Because remember that different parts of the universe 0:09:03.320 --> 0:09:06.680 are at different temperatures, and that something's temperature determined the 0:09:06.800 --> 0:09:09.559 light it emits. Our Sun emits light in the visible 0:09:09.600 --> 0:09:13.960 spectrum because its surface is around five thousand kelvin, and 0:09:14.000 --> 0:09:17.319 the Earth emits light in the infrared because it is 0:09:17.480 --> 0:09:20.400 much much cooler. And you emit light in the infrared 0:09:20.480 --> 0:09:23.440 because you are also cooler than the Sun but hotter 0:09:23.600 --> 0:09:26.200 than the Earth. And things out there that are super 0:09:26.280 --> 0:09:29.880 duper hot, like the surface of neutron stars or jets 0:09:30.040 --> 0:09:33.319 near black holes, they only emit in the X ray. 0:09:33.400 --> 0:09:35.040 So if you look at some corner of the universe, 0:09:35.040 --> 0:09:37.200 it might seem dark until you turn on your X 0:09:37.280 --> 0:09:39.640 ray eyeballs and then all of a sudden, it's glowing 0:09:39.880 --> 0:09:42.480 very brightly. Yeah. But I think what's also cool is that, 0:09:42.800 --> 0:09:45.120 you know, like our Sun emits both light in the 0:09:45.200 --> 0:09:47.719 visible spectrum, but also it emits X rays right like 0:09:47.760 --> 0:09:50.679 you can look up pictures of X ray what the 0:09:50.720 --> 0:09:53.200 Sun looks like with X ray glasses. Yeah, the Sun 0:09:53.200 --> 0:09:56.079 emits all kinds of radiation that our eye can't see, 0:09:56.520 --> 0:09:59.160 from infrared light all the way up to X rays 0:09:59.200 --> 0:10:01.720 and even in articles. We talked recently about how you 0:10:01.720 --> 0:10:04.120 could see the Sun in new trinos if you had 0:10:04.160 --> 0:10:07.240 new trino glasses. So while it's true that the Sun 0:10:07.280 --> 0:10:09.600 peaks in the visible spectrum that's where a lot of 0:10:09.600 --> 0:10:12.959 its light is emitted, it's not exclusive to the visible spectrum. 0:10:12.960 --> 0:10:15.200 It also does produce some X rays and it tells 0:10:15.200 --> 0:10:17.080 a different story. If you look at a picture of 0:10:17.120 --> 0:10:20.240 the Sun in infrared or visible or X ray, you 0:10:20.280 --> 0:10:22.680 see sort of different parts of the Sun. Different things 0:10:22.760 --> 0:10:25.080 are going on. Yeah, And so if the more we 0:10:25.080 --> 0:10:27.440 can see in other parts of the light spectrum, the 0:10:27.440 --> 0:10:30.160 more we can learn about the universe. And so humans 0:10:30.240 --> 0:10:33.720 have been building better and better X ray telescopes, and 0:10:33.760 --> 0:10:36.600 as part of our mission to be nicer to astronomers, 0:10:36.840 --> 0:10:39.280 we let them give them really silly names like the 0:10:39.400 --> 0:10:42.760 nicer telescope and I C E R. Yeah. So to 0:10:42.800 --> 0:10:50.160 the end, the program will be tagging the question what 0:10:50.240 --> 0:10:54.360 does the nicer telescope study? Now, Daniel, isn't the answer obvious? 0:10:54.400 --> 0:10:57.960 Doesn't it study things that the less nice telescopes can study. 0:10:58.040 --> 0:11:01.040 There's a huge rivalry and astronomy between the nicer telescope 0:11:01.080 --> 0:11:04.280 and the meaner telescope to see which is better for 0:11:04.400 --> 0:11:08.320 learning about the universe. But then there's the third rivalry 0:11:08.360 --> 0:11:11.640 there with the naughty astronomers. Are you nice, naughty or 0:11:11.760 --> 0:11:15.920 net or nasty or mean? You said mean, right, meter 0:11:16.080 --> 0:11:19.360 telescope exactly. We know who's getting the Christmas presents from Santa, 0:11:19.640 --> 0:11:23.440 but who's getting the goods about the universe. No, there's 0:11:23.480 --> 0:11:26.040 nothing nice or mean about the Nicer Telescope. It's just 0:11:26.080 --> 0:11:31.319 a ridiculous acronym. It stands for neutron Star Interior Composition 0:11:31.640 --> 0:11:35.680 explore Er. They pulled that are at the from the 0:11:35.800 --> 0:11:38.000 end of Explorer to make it nicer. Why not just 0:11:38.040 --> 0:11:40.680 call it the nice Telescope? Why did they have to 0:11:41.080 --> 0:11:43.200 pull up the R from me from the end? I 0:11:43.240 --> 0:11:45.600 have no idea. The nice Telescope sounds pretty good, right, 0:11:45.640 --> 0:11:47.360 but I guess they wanted if you need to win 0:11:47.400 --> 0:11:51.360 a grand proposal these days, you know, not just nice nicer. Oh. 0:11:51.480 --> 0:11:53.560 I see, it's like two point Oh, it's like nice 0:11:53.600 --> 0:11:57.560 two point oh, next generation of nice Telescope. I also 0:11:57.600 --> 0:12:00.160 like how they skipped the star. They're just like, it's 0:12:00.240 --> 0:12:02.360 just not include star in our acronym. I mean, it 0:12:02.360 --> 0:12:05.920 really should be like the Ciser. Now I see why 0:12:05.960 --> 0:12:07.960 they skipped the star. Well, I guess they want to 0:12:08.000 --> 0:12:09.440 leave room so that the next one could be the 0:12:09.559 --> 0:12:12.920 nicest telescope. Then where do they go from there? You know, 0:12:13.040 --> 0:12:16.800 double nice, double nicest, uber nice to go for the 0:12:17.000 --> 0:12:20.240 Mother Teresa telescope. I guess they haven't named themselves on 0:12:20.320 --> 0:12:22.720 corner of the way the ground based telescopes have. You know, 0:12:22.760 --> 0:12:27.280 they've got an extremely large, ultra large, absurdly large telescope. 0:12:27.559 --> 0:12:30.200 Is that for real? Is there an absurdely large telescope? 0:12:30.559 --> 0:12:33.559 Official name? No, I'm joking. The actual title of it 0:12:33.600 --> 0:12:37.400 is called the overwhelmingly Large Telescope. And that's a real title, 0:12:37.440 --> 0:12:42.800 of a regular real title. No, that is overwhelmingly crazy. 0:12:43.080 --> 0:12:45.080 The biggest telescope that's actually gonna be bilt is called 0:12:45.080 --> 0:12:49.080 extremely large. Overwhelmingly large was a little overwhelmingly large, and 0:12:49.080 --> 0:12:54.360 so it wasn't actually funded. It was overwhelmingly rejected. I 0:12:54.440 --> 0:12:57.040 was overwhelmingly excited about it. But we could learn a 0:12:57.120 --> 0:13:00.400 huge amount about the universe. But anyway, they were under welmed. 0:13:02.160 --> 0:13:05.679 It's certainly underfunded. But this is a new telescope, sort 0:13:05.679 --> 0:13:08.680 of relatively new in the last couple of years that's 0:13:08.679 --> 0:13:10.800 out there studying the X rays that are coming to 0:13:10.880 --> 0:13:12.839 us from other parts of the universe. So we can 0:13:12.840 --> 0:13:15.679 study amazing things and we were wondering how many people 0:13:15.760 --> 0:13:19.040 had heard of this telescope and what it's studying. So 0:13:19.120 --> 0:13:21.200 Daniel went out there into the wilds of the internet 0:13:21.480 --> 0:13:24.000 to ask people the question, what do you think the 0:13:24.120 --> 0:13:27.959 Nicer Telescope studies? And I'm continuously indebted to those of 0:13:28.040 --> 0:13:30.600 you who are willing to volunteer to answer these questions 0:13:30.679 --> 0:13:33.120 and give us a sense for what people know and 0:13:33.160 --> 0:13:35.920 what they are curious about. If you'd like to participate, 0:13:36.000 --> 0:13:38.440 please write to us two questions at Daniel and Jore 0:13:38.679 --> 0:13:41.920 dot com. Everybody's welcome. Here's what people had to say 0:13:42.720 --> 0:13:47.880 my guests on what Nicer Telescope Study stands for or 0:13:48.000 --> 0:13:53.720 the acronym nicer is Nebula interstellar clinical EFORK research where 0:13:53.840 --> 0:13:57.600 I think we study the actual beauty of nebulas through 0:13:57.600 --> 0:14:02.640 a telescope and it's a fact on psychedelic trips, clothing patterns, 0:14:02.679 --> 0:14:09.560 and obsession among humans. Well, this is um my favorite subject. 0:14:10.679 --> 0:14:18.040 No turn stars, so nice will study no tron stars. 0:14:18.640 --> 0:14:21.960 This is what I have until now, not know how 0:14:22.000 --> 0:14:25.840 it will work and when it will be on, but 0:14:26.640 --> 0:14:30.440 can wait to find out more. I have no idea 0:14:30.560 --> 0:14:36.160 the Nicer Telescope studies how nice things are or does 0:14:36.160 --> 0:14:40.560 it study ice like the end stands for something I 0:14:40.600 --> 0:14:42.920 don't know, and then ice like does it? Is it 0:14:43.040 --> 0:14:47.360 some telescope that's going to find more water on Mars 0:14:47.520 --> 0:14:52.120 or other moons of the Solar System or exoplanets or 0:14:52.720 --> 0:14:55.680 I don't know. Yeah, I'll go with that. The nicer 0:14:56.160 --> 0:15:02.400 telescope studies ice on other select soul bodies. Nicer, Well, 0:15:02.440 --> 0:15:05.400 that's gonna be some acronym that's good for funding. So 0:15:05.440 --> 0:15:11.920 how about nearly impossibly cool electromagnetic radiation? I have no idea. 0:15:12.040 --> 0:15:15.720 I'm not going to make up some gas of the acronym. No, 0:15:16.040 --> 0:15:18.600 I've never heard of it. All right, I'm surprised nobody 0:15:18.640 --> 0:15:20.800 said nice things. I like the person who said it 0:15:20.840 --> 0:15:24.920 studies how nice things are? You can measure the niceness 0:15:24.960 --> 0:15:28.600 of astrophysical objects like, oh, that black hole looks so nice? 0:15:28.800 --> 0:15:30.960 Can you measure that? Are their physical units for that? 0:15:31.240 --> 0:15:36.520 For nicety it's measured in oz. But it is a 0:15:36.600 --> 0:15:39.520 sort of an interesting telescope to talk about, and lots 0:15:39.520 --> 0:15:42.640 of fascinating exploration that it's doing. And so Daniel, maybe 0:15:42.640 --> 0:15:45.440 step us through this again. What is nicer stand for? 0:15:45.680 --> 0:15:51.160 So nicer stands for again? Neutron Star Interior Composition Explorer, 0:15:51.400 --> 0:15:53.520 which tells you already a little bit about its mission. 0:15:53.720 --> 0:15:57.880 It's designed to understand the interior of Neutron Star. We 0:15:57.920 --> 0:16:00.120 call this thing a telescope, but if you saw to 0:16:00.280 --> 0:16:02.960 this thing, you wouldn't think that's a telescope, right. I 0:16:03.000 --> 0:16:04.400 have a picture of here in front of me, and 0:16:04.440 --> 0:16:08.000 it looks like a refrigerator, basically like a box, like 0:16:08.040 --> 0:16:11.440 a refrigerator box. It looks more like a particle physics 0:16:11.440 --> 0:16:13.680 detector because it kind of is. It's it's right on 0:16:13.720 --> 0:16:16.720 the boundary between the kind of devices that astronomers built, 0:16:16.760 --> 0:16:20.160 like classical telescopes, and those devices that particle physicists build, 0:16:20.160 --> 0:16:22.880 which are basically always look like the board ship. Yeah, 0:16:22.880 --> 0:16:24.760 and this one is kind of It looks like a cube, 0:16:25.040 --> 0:16:27.320 and it has a frame and it's got some like 0:16:27.320 --> 0:16:29.880 a grid on one side, so it does sort of 0:16:29.920 --> 0:16:32.000 look like an air conditioning unit that you would see 0:16:32.040 --> 0:16:34.440 sticking out of a window. It does look like an 0:16:34.440 --> 0:16:37.200 air conditioning unit. And it's basically just a box with 0:16:37.240 --> 0:16:39.280 a bunch of tubes in it. And the reason it's 0:16:39.280 --> 0:16:41.760 so different from the kind of telescope you imagine when 0:16:41.760 --> 0:16:43.920 you think about Hubble or when you go to your 0:16:43.960 --> 0:16:47.520 astronomy night at your nearby university. Is because X rays 0:16:47.520 --> 0:16:49.960 are very very different from visible light in how they 0:16:50.000 --> 0:16:52.520 interact with matter, So you need a very different kind 0:16:52.520 --> 0:16:55.200 of system to like gather the light and to bend 0:16:55.240 --> 0:16:57.800 it and to focus it. Because X rays mostly just 0:16:57.840 --> 0:17:00.600 go through stuff like X rays would go right through 0:17:00.680 --> 0:17:03.280 hubble nicely, So even if you had a lens, the 0:17:03.440 --> 0:17:05.119 X rays, which just goes through the glass, that they 0:17:05.119 --> 0:17:07.840 wouldn't ben necessarily. That's right. X rays, when it hid 0:17:07.840 --> 0:17:10.040 an object sort of head on that way the way 0:17:10.040 --> 0:17:12.480 you might hit a lens, they would just penetrate through 0:17:12.720 --> 0:17:16.119 because they have very high frequency. And remember that while 0:17:16.280 --> 0:17:19.440 air and glass seemed transparent to us in the visible light, 0:17:19.640 --> 0:17:23.520 different things are transparent or opaque to X rays. And 0:17:23.600 --> 0:17:26.800 so while your body is mostly transparent to X rays, 0:17:26.800 --> 0:17:28.119 which is why you can use it to take a 0:17:28.119 --> 0:17:31.800 picture of your insides, the air is mostly opaque to 0:17:32.040 --> 0:17:35.399 X rays. Like our atmosphere blocks almost all X rays, 0:17:35.680 --> 0:17:37.720 which is why all the X ray telescopes have to 0:17:37.720 --> 0:17:40.800 be like on balloons or on or in space. That's 0:17:40.800 --> 0:17:43.879 why this one is attached to the International Space Station, 0:17:44.000 --> 0:17:46.960 and so you can't use typical optics to gather and 0:17:47.000 --> 0:17:50.040 focus X rays for that reason. Interesting, but can it 0:17:50.480 --> 0:17:53.160 focus at all or is it are there any moving 0:17:53.200 --> 0:17:54.800 parts to it or is it just a box with 0:17:54.920 --> 0:17:58.560 little sensors in it. It's mostly a box with collimating sensors. 0:17:58.600 --> 0:18:01.120 So you have these tubes and the X ray hits 0:18:01.119 --> 0:18:02.720 one of the tubes, and at the end of the 0:18:02.720 --> 0:18:04.960 tube is a little detector that tells you I got 0:18:05.000 --> 0:18:08.520 an X ray. And the idea is that these are collimators, 0:18:08.720 --> 0:18:10.320 and so you can sort of point this thing in 0:18:10.400 --> 0:18:12.919 one direction and that limits the focus, so you're not 0:18:13.000 --> 0:18:15.760 just getting X rays from the whole universe onto the 0:18:15.760 --> 0:18:18.320 back plane, which is where your detectors are. You have, 0:18:18.440 --> 0:18:20.400 like you know, a bunch of tubes, so you can 0:18:20.440 --> 0:18:22.800 only look sort of in one direction. So that's one 0:18:22.840 --> 0:18:26.080 aspect of these tubes there, collimators. They restrict your field 0:18:26.119 --> 0:18:29.200 of view, so you know what you're looking at. They're 0:18:29.280 --> 0:18:31.720 literally sort of like looking through a tube kind of, 0:18:31.800 --> 0:18:33.800 you know, like a cardboard tube. If you look through it, 0:18:33.800 --> 0:18:36.280 it limits you to only look at one thing in 0:18:36.320 --> 0:18:38.280 front of you. Yeah, and that's the way your eye 0:18:38.280 --> 0:18:40.679 works also, right, The reason that our eyes are in 0:18:40.800 --> 0:18:43.840 set inside our heads and behind a little hole, so 0:18:43.920 --> 0:18:45.920 you can tell sort of where the light came from 0:18:46.119 --> 0:18:48.200 based on where it hits the back of your eye, 0:18:48.440 --> 0:18:50.680 rather than just having light sensitive cells on the surface 0:18:50.920 --> 0:18:52.600 where you can just tell that there is light or 0:18:52.640 --> 0:18:55.439 there isn't light. And so by having these tubes in 0:18:55.520 --> 0:18:57.880 front of your X ray detectors, you can tell when 0:18:57.880 --> 0:18:59.399 the X ray hits detector at the back of the 0:18:59.440 --> 0:19:01.840 tube where it came from. And it's a little bit 0:19:01.880 --> 0:19:04.160 better than that because the tubes also do a very 0:19:04.200 --> 0:19:06.800 small amount of focusing. What do you mean, Well, it's 0:19:06.800 --> 0:19:08.800 hard to focus X rays when they hit straight on, 0:19:08.920 --> 0:19:12.080 but you can do like grazing focusing. If an X 0:19:12.160 --> 0:19:15.480 ray comes in at a very high angle to some surfaces, 0:19:15.560 --> 0:19:18.159 to some kinds of materials, they will bounce off at 0:19:18.160 --> 0:19:21.240 a slightly different angle. So they have these really weird 0:19:21.359 --> 0:19:23.520 kind of they call them lenses, but they're nothing like 0:19:23.600 --> 0:19:26.320 what you would recognize that These very special shapes are 0:19:26.359 --> 0:19:30.280 called paraboloids and hyperboloids and their designs. So the X 0:19:30.400 --> 0:19:32.560 ray comes in at a very high angle and then 0:19:32.640 --> 0:19:36.520 gets bent very slightly towards your detector, so it's sort 0:19:36.520 --> 0:19:38.919 of like the tube is larger on one side and 0:19:39.000 --> 0:19:41.080 smaller on the other, and it just sort of like 0:19:41.320 --> 0:19:44.160 tapers a little bit to gather the X rays down 0:19:44.240 --> 0:19:47.399 to the bottom. So it does have like a focusing lens. 0:19:47.520 --> 0:19:49.480 It's just not made out of glass. It's not made 0:19:49.520 --> 0:19:52.359 out of glass. This thing is made out of twenty 0:19:52.440 --> 0:19:56.360 four concentric shells of aluminum that are coated in gold, 0:19:56.640 --> 0:19:58.840 and the gold has the right properties to sort of 0:19:59.119 --> 0:20:01.840 change the angle the X rays just a little bit. Remember, 0:20:01.840 --> 0:20:04.679 these are very very high energy photons, so it's very 0:20:04.680 --> 0:20:07.919 hard to bend them at all. Sounds expensive exactly. And 0:20:07.920 --> 0:20:10.840 they have fifty six of these tubes, and on the 0:20:10.880 --> 0:20:14.400 back plane they have silicon detectors that can detect these 0:20:14.520 --> 0:20:16.840 X rays. When X ray smashes into it, it like 0:20:16.960 --> 0:20:19.879 releases an electron that's in the silicon wafer in the 0:20:19.920 --> 0:20:22.040 neck and get picked up by a circuitry. So it's 0:20:22.080 --> 0:20:24.800 basically just like a digital camera on the back plane 0:20:25.080 --> 0:20:27.840 that's sensitive to X rays that are focused onto it 0:20:28.000 --> 0:20:31.800 by these very gradually tapering tubes. And so these tubes 0:20:31.840 --> 0:20:33.600 are kind of in a box, and this box is 0:20:33.920 --> 0:20:36.320 sort of like attached the to the outside of the 0:20:36.359 --> 0:20:38.840 International Space Station. Yeah, it's got like a little arm 0:20:38.920 --> 0:20:40.960 and it's stuck to the space station and they can 0:20:41.000 --> 0:20:43.040 turn it so they can point at different things, like 0:20:43.080 --> 0:20:44.920 a look at this star and look at that star. 0:20:45.119 --> 0:20:47.520 And it's maintained by the astronauts, and it was just 0:20:47.680 --> 0:20:50.840 done recently. It's it's sort of in the last few years, right. Yeah, 0:20:50.840 --> 0:20:53.480 it was installed in two thousand seventeen, So the space 0:20:53.480 --> 0:20:55.800 station has been up there for decades, right, but they 0:20:55.880 --> 0:20:58.119 keep adding to the science mission. It's pretty cool to 0:20:58.160 --> 0:21:00.520 have a facility in space where you can all new 0:21:00.640 --> 0:21:03.280 stuff and you can have people maintain it and control it. 0:21:03.359 --> 0:21:04.760 And so this has been up there for the last 0:21:04.760 --> 0:21:07.760 five years and it's done a lot of really interesting 0:21:07.760 --> 0:21:10.119 science already. And it's sort of name with the word 0:21:10.160 --> 0:21:13.199 neutron star in its name, but it actually sort of 0:21:13.280 --> 0:21:16.320 studies a wider range of X rays, right, what are 0:21:16.359 --> 0:21:18.840 called soft X rays. Yeah, we have a variety of 0:21:19.000 --> 0:21:21.240 X ray telescopes. You might have heard of Chandra and 0:21:21.280 --> 0:21:24.320 other space based telescopes that are capable of seeing the 0:21:24.359 --> 0:21:27.600