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Could the Higgs boson really destroy the universe?
Welcome
© Tobias Roetsch
This month All About Space takes a look into the distant future of our very own Solar System. It's a time where Mars loses a moon and gains a ring, our Sun swells into an allencompassing red giant – eventually evolving into a black dwarf – Earth's surface reaches blisteringly hot temperatures and there's a bit of a stellar jig as a selection of stars in the universe swing closer to our solar neighbourhood. The Solar System is the model of stability but, as you'll discover this issue, that's all evidently about to change. Keeping in with the theme of the Solar System, we head to Mars this month as – at the time of writing – NASA prepares to send its new rover, Perseverance, to the surface of the Red Planet. Scheduled for launch
on 17 July, the spacecraft will land on 18 February next year to begin hunting for signs of life, additionally collecting rock and soil samples with the aim of returning them to Earth for further investigation. Also this month, we take you on a tour of the night sky, so get ready to feast your eyes on a gaggle of galaxies, sizzling summer nebulae, planets and, of course, our Moon. You might have noticed that All About Space has been missing from the newsstand for a number of issues due to the coronavirus pandemic. However, I am pleased to confirm that the magazine will be available in supermarkets and newsagents again from, and including, issue 106.
Ourcontributorsinclude… Kulvinder Singh Chadha
Space science writer July 2012 saw the discovery of the Higgs Boson. But could the particle really destroy the universe? Turn to page 32 to find out.
Astronomer Discover how to get the very best views of the Solar System and beyond with Stuart's full guides on catching the planet of the month, lunar craters and more.
Peter Beck
Lee Cavendish
CEO of Rocket Lab Peter reveals how his company is developing the latest in rocket technology, NASA's involvement and what's next on the space exploration agenda.
Staff writer Turn to page 38 for Lee's report on what we can expect from NASA's new rover, Perseverance. Like Curiosity, find out how it will hunt for life.
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WITH THE UNIVERSE
06
SpaceX makes history by flying two NASA astronauts to the Space Station aboard the Crew Dragon for the very first time
FEATURES
14 Future of the Solar System
It may be a model of longterm stability, but our solar neighbourhood's future holds some spectacular changes
22 Future tech Satellite repair droids 24 Destination Alpha Centauri Some of the world's top scientists are looking to reach for our nearest stars
32 The Higgs boson Could this particle really destroy the universe?
38 Prepare for Perseverance NASA sends its next-generation rover to the Red Planet – here's what to expect from the mission
46 Interview The man behind Rocket Lab
The CEO of the private spaceflight company, Peter Beck, talks exciting plans for the future
52 What would you sound like on other worlds? How your voice would differ if you were able to talk on another planet or moon
56 Focus on Nancy Grace Roman Space Telescope 58 Sizzling summer nebulae Take a tour of some of the treasures held in the warm Northern Hemisphere
64 Ask Space Your questions answered by our space experts
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Explore science and the history of the universe, and find out what you can do to save our home planet from climate change
STARGAZER Your complete guide to the night sky
SIZZLING SUMMER NEBULAE
68 What’s in the sky? Although the sky never truly gets dark, embrace the challenge of summer stargazing
72 Month's planets There will be a lot to observe in the sky around Venus over the next few weeks
74 Moon tour How to find one of the most striking but overlooked craters on the lunar surface
75 Naked eye and binocular targets There are fascinating targets to see in the night sky
76 Deep sky challenge There's no need to put your telescope into hibernation on light summer nights
78 The Northern Hemisphere
OLD FOR THE
TEM?
Plenty of targets for those armed with the right kit
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58
THE HIGGS BOSON
80 Telescope review Is the Celestron NexStar 6SE the right telescope for you? Here's our lowdown
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Nighttime rover exploration
© Fernando Gandía/GMV
Unfortunately you can’t test a rover’s ability to traverse the Moon without actually going there. European Space Agency (ESA) engineers have done the next best thing: drive a test rover across Tenerife at night in order to simulate the low-light conditions on the lunar surface. Tenerife’s Teide National Park recently accommodated the ESA’s Heavy Duty Planetary Rover to gain experience with the craft’s navigation hardware and software on volcanic and rocky ground. This terrain at night is supposed to simulate the conditions at the Moon’s poles, which the space agency hopes to explore in the near future.
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This is certainly a peculiar galaxy, but it is no less beautiful. The Hubble Space Telescope observed the enormous NGC 4100, and highlighted the regions where new, young stars are being born. In a galaxy’s spiral arms, gas and dust can lay dormant for billions of years, but when gravity pulls material together, it kick-starts explosive star formation. This stellar inception causes Herculean emissions of radiation that illuminate the surrounding gas – Hubble has picked this out as bright, blue patches.
© NASA/ ESA & Hubble
Blue marks the spot for baby stars
It’s not every day that Hubble captures a comet in the process of breaking up. Comet C/2019 Y4 (ATLAS) was first discovered in December 2019 by the Asteroid Terrestrial-impact Last Alert System (ATLAS) in Hawaii and continued to gain attention as it became brighter and brighter. This gradual illumination abruptly ended, and Hubble was able to show that this was because the comet was breaking up into roughly 30 pieces. These fragments were being stripped of their layers due to the unfiltered rays of the Sun and produced a remarkable solar-swept tail of dust.
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© NASA/ ESA
Hubble captures a comet’s demise
© ESO
Watching the birth of a planet This is not the eye of a tornado; something far less destructive is happening in this image. Taken with the European Southern Observatory’s (ESO) Very Large Telescope (VLT), new worlds are in the process of being born 520 light years away from Earth. This polarised image of the young star AB Aurigae shows a huge disc around it containing dust, gas and rock caught in a spin. Within the brighter spots, rocks are accreting more and more mass, which will eventually bring enough material together to form planetesimals.
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Liftoff! SpaceX launches first astronauts for NASA on historic test flight
S
©SpaceX
Words by Amy Thompson paceX launched astronauts for the first time ever today, making history and beginning
a new age of commercial spaceflight. A Falcon 9 rocket lifted off from historic Pad 39A at NASA’s Kennedy Space Center on 30 May at 20:22 BST carrying SpaceX’s Crew Dragon capsule into orbit. The launch kicked off SpaceX’s landmark Demo-2 mission, which is sending NASA astronauts Bob Behnken and Doug Hurley to the International Space Station (ISS).
Pad 39A is also the site from which the Apollo 11 astronauts launched
absence, and it signals the beginning of a new era in space exploration – one led by commercial companies. “It was incredible,” Hurley radioed SpaceX’s launch control. “Appreciate all the hard work, and thanks for a great ride to space.” US President Donald Trump and Vice President Mike Pence were on hand to watch the launch live from the Kennedy Space Center. Trump told reporters ahead of the launch that he felt an obligation as president to watch the historic liftoff. Shortly after launching Hurley and Behnken into orbit, SpaceX also notched another rocket landing under its belt. The Falcon 9 booster’s first stage made a smooth landing on SpaceX’s drone ship Of Course I Still Love You in the Atlantic Ocean. The launch was originally scheduled to occur on Wednesday 27 May, but bad weather forced the NASA-SpaceX team to scrub that attempt about 20 minutes before liftoff. In addition to Trump and Pence, huge crowds were expected to watch SpaceX’s first crewed launch. While NASA cautioned space fans not to travel to the launch site due to the ongoing coronavirus pandemic, the launch took place as Florida is reopening its businesses. The Kennedy Space Center Visitor’s Complex, for example, reopened its doors on 28 May. A day earlier the first launch attempt drew an estimated 150,000 spectators to Florida’s Space Coast. Demo-2 is the final test before NASA can fully validate Crew Dragon and the Falcon 9 for human spaceflight. Once that happens SpaceX can start flying astronauts to and from the space station on a regular basis. Behnken and Hurley arrived at the space station safely on 31 May at 13:16 BST. They docked at the station’s Harmony module and will remain parked there for one to four months.
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©NASA
Demo-2 marks the return of orbital human spaceflight to US soil after a nearly decade-long
©NASA
New marsquake study could shatter theories on how Marrs was born
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Words by Gemma Lavender
A team of researchers based at the University of
Crushing the molten m
Tokyo has revealed tantalising details about Mars’ seismic activity for the very first time. These new
mix under a presssure of 13 gigapascals usingg a multi-
results could make or break theories surrounding the Red Planet’s origins and provide details about
anvil press, they were able to measure seism mic activity.
its composition.
In this case Nishida captured
The fourth rock from the Sun might be one of the closest worlds to us – swinging between distances
P-waves travelling at a velocity of 4,680 metres (15,354 feet) per second through the
of 55 million and 400 million kilometres (34 million and 249 million miles) dependent on its position
alloy and snapped images of the action using X-ray beams from two synchrotron facilities: the Photon
and Earth’s position relative to our star – but it is often much safer and less expensive to investigate
Factory, which forms part of Japan’s High Energy Accelerator Research Organization, and SPring-8 in
the Red Planet through simulations on Earth, rather than launching a spacecraft.
Harima Science Park City, Hyogo Prefecture, Japan. Using Nishida and his team’s findings, planetary
No one knew this better than Keisuke Nishida,
researchers could read Martian seismic data to find
an assistant professor at the University of Toyko’s
out whether or not the Red Planet’s core consists
Department of Earth and Planetary Science, and his team, who delved deep into the Red Planet by
primarily of iron-sulphur, Nishida said. “If it isn’t, that will tell us something of Mars’ origins,” Nishida
mimicking the conditions in the planet’s uppermost core with the help of a molten iron-sulphur alloy, which they brought to a scorching melting-point temperature of 1,500 degrees Celsius (2,732 degrees Fahrenheit).
said. “For example, if Mars’ core includes silicon and oxygen it suggests that, like Earth, Mars suffered a huge impact event as it formed. So, what is Mars made of and how was it formed? I think we are about to find out.”
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Massive galactic disc could change our understanding of galaxies
Words by Chelsea Gohd
found out that the object was a large, stable, rotating
disc, clocking in at a whopping 70 billion times the mass of our Sun. Researchers suggest that the galaxy – which appears as it was when the universe was just 1.5 billion years old, or ten per cent of its current age – might have formed by a process known as ‘coldmode accretion’. They think that the gas falling in towards the galaxy’s centre was actually cold, so because the gas didn’t need time to cool down as it approached the galactic centre, the disc was able to more rapidly condense.
The disc galaxy is 70 times the mass of our Sun
©NRAO
A massive, rotating disc galaxy that first formed just 1.5 billion years after the Big Bang could upend our understanding of galaxy formation, scientists suggest in a new study. In traditional galaxy formation models and according to modern cosmology, galaxies are built beginning with dark-matter halos. Over time those halos pull in gases and material, eventually building up full-fledged galaxies. Disc galaxies, like our own Milky Way, form with prominent discs of stars and gas and are thought to be created in a method known as ‘hot-mode’ galaxy formation, where gas falls inward towards the galaxy’s central region where it then cools and condenses. This process is thought to be fairly gradual, taking a long time. But the newly discovered galaxy DLA0817g, nicknamed the ‘Wolfe Disc’, which scientists believe formed in the early universe, suggests that disc galaxies could actually form quite quickly. Led by Marcel Neeleman of the Max Planck Institute for Astronomy in Germany, researchers spotted the Wolfe Disc using ALMA, the Atacama Large Millimeter/submillimeter Array in Chile. They
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Scientists peer back in time to find new evidence for watery plumes on Europa
Love isolation? NASA wants you to spend eight months locked in a Russian lab Words by Chelsea Gohd
Words by Chelsea Gohd Scientists looked back in
Do you thrive in social isolation? NASA is looking for people to spend eight months locked in a
time to offer new evidence suggesting that plumes of water vapour shoot out
Russian lab for a new experiment. When humans return to the Moon and travel to Mars, they will
into space from Jupiter’s moon Europa. In this new
need to be prepared for long-duration space travel
study researchers used observations made by the
© ESA
and even longer stays on these far-off destinations. Currently NASA’s Artemis program aims to land humans on the Moon for the first time since NASA’s Apollo 17 mission landed in 1972. While the Moon is the main goal of NASA’s Artemis program, the agency’s larger goal is to
used in 2011 for a notable series of Russian mock Mars missions known as Mars500. During these
send crewed missions to Mars. But long-term space travel and habitation won’t be easy. Such missions
missions, crews spent 520 and 105 days – on two separate missions – in the facility.
will present both physical and mental challenges as astronauts work to not only survive, but perform important scientific research in uniquely difficult environments. In the upcoming NASA-Russia experiment – which builds upon a previous four-month-long study from 2019 – a crew will live in isolation in a closed facility at Russia’s Institute for Biomedical Problems, which is in Moscow, NASA officials said in a statement. This habitat facility was
Participants that join the experiment’s crew will spend eight months inside a closed facility that according to the statement will have “environmental aspects similar to those astronauts are expected to experience on future missions to Mars.” The crew will spend these months living together in isolation and working on scientific research. They will even virtually conduct experiments that future astronauts might be expected to perform on locations like the lunar surface.
Galileo spacecraft to simulate the movement of positively
Above: Could you spend eight months isolated with a small crew?
charged subatomic particles called protons near the moon. While flying by the icy world in 2000, Galileo found fewer protons around Europa than researchers expected. They chalked this up to issues with the probe’s instrument. The team found that some of these ‘missing protons’ weren’t registered because a water plume shooting out from the moon blocked them from the instrument. A different instrument on Galileo conducted magnetic field studies of the moon, and the researchers were able to show a disruption in nearby magnetic fields when the plume shot out to support their theory. The ESA aims to probe this world closer with its highly anticipated Jupiter Icy Moons Explorer in 2022, while NASA will be launching the Europa Clipper spacecraft in 2024.
First super-fast pulsar found snacking on companion in far-flung star cluster
Words by Gemma Lavender
system in which it is siphoning material from a stellar companion. A research team led by Zhichen Pan and Di Li from the National Astronomical Observatories of the Chinese Academy of Sciences (NAOC), which operates FAST, has shown that M92A spins at a rapid speed of 316.5 rotations per second and co-orbits a star lighter than our Sun, weighing in at 0.18 solar masses. Using FAST the researchers observed two eclipsing events in the binary system – when one object passed in front of the other from Earth’s point of view. One eclipse lasted around 5,000 seconds, and the second, which arrived between 1,000 and 2,000 seconds later, lasted for 500 seconds. M92A is known as a millisecond pulsar, a souped-up version of the slightly slower moving pulsar. Millisecond pulsars are highly magnetised neutron stars which pirouette rapidly at speeds less than 30 milliseconds.
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Left: The binary pair was spotted in Messier 92 Right: Galileo data is still revealing exciting new things about Jupiter and its moons
© NASA/JPL-Caltech
© ESA
China’s Five-hundred-meter Aperture Spherical Telescope (FAST) has uncovered the first known pulsar in Messier 92, a globular star cluster roughly 27,000 light years away in the constellation of Hercules. The swiftly spinning and pulsating object, which goes by two names – PSR J1717+4307A and M92A – forms one part of an eclipsing binary
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On 2 July 1985, the European Space Agency launched Europe’s first deep-space mission, Giotto. Which famous comet did it fly past, providing the first close-up images of a comet’s nucleus, on 13 March 1986? A: Comet Shoemaker-Levy 9
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Future of the Solar System
14
Future of the Solar System
WHAT DOES THE FUTURE HOLD FOR THE
SOLAR SYSTEM? It may be a model of long-term stability, but our solar neighbourhood’s future holds some cataclysmic events and spectacular changes Reported by Giles Sparrow
ver since it settled down from a period of early turbulence about 4 billion years ago, our Solar System has provided a more or less stable home to Earth and the other planets and bodies that orbit the Sun. But how long will it stay that way? It’s certain that the Sun is ultimately doomed to brighten and swell enormously in size, becoming a red giant whose bloated outer atmosphere will threaten to engulf the Solar System’s inner worlds 7 billion years from now – but long before then there are sure to be other changes that alter our planet and others, perhaps beyond recognition. In the relatively near future, it is tidal forces between planets and their satellites that are likely to have the most impressive effects. These arise as angular momentum is transferred between the planet and moon due to tides on the planet and in response to the moon’s gravity, resulting in a consistent ‘tug’ on the moon’s orbit. For most moons in the Solar System the result is that the satellite slowly spirals away from the
E
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Future of the Solar System planet, while the planet slows its rotation. This is
to 40 million years from now Phobos may reach a
what is happening in our own planetary system
crisis point when it gets too close to Mars.
– the Moon gets an average of 3.8 centimetres (1.5 inches) farther away from Earth each year, while
Previous calculations had revealed how long it would take for the 22-kilometre (14-mile) moon
Earth’s rotation slows by 1.7 milliseconds per century. Over millions of years the orbits of most
to migrate inwards, but Black and Mittal’s work suggests Phobos might not make it that far. “We
moons in the Solar System will get wider.
predict that Phobos won’t make it all the way to
But for a couple of moons, the opposite is happening – they’re slowly spiralling towards
Mars, but instead will break apart sooner than that,” says Black. “We find that the key to Phobos’ fate is
their planets. One of these is Phobos, the inner of Mars’ two rocky moons – but why is it different?
its strength. If Phobos is sufficiently strong, tidal stresses won’t be able to tear it apart, and it will
“The inward migration of Phobos is due to the fact that its orbital period is slightly shorter than
crash into Mars intact. But the evidence points to Phobos being very weak.”
the rotational period of Mars,” explains Professor Ben Black of the City University of New York. “The
“We considered the possible fates of Phobos in a self-consistent manner and utilised models
Martian tidal bulge tugs at Phobos like a dog-walker
developed in terrestrial rock physics – geotechnical
pulling on a leash.” Alongside graduate student Tushar Mittal, Black recently looked at the Martian
models like those used in the construction of tunnels,” adds Mittal. And the result? Phobos’
moon’s future evolution, suggesting that in about 20
structural weakness means that it will disintegrate
How Mars will gain a ring
© NASA\JPL-Caltech
© Tobias Roetsch
The disintegration of inner moon Phobos will create a ring around the Red Planet about 20 million years from now
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Spiralling inwards
Tidal break-up
Because Phobos orbits so quickly, the tidal bulge it creates on the planet acts to tug it backwards, removing energy and sending it spiralling inwards. Present day
Phobos drifts within Mars’ Roche limit – a zone closer to the surface where gravity makes it impossible for a large body to orbit. Around 20 million years from now
Ring formation
Ring decay
As Phobos breaks apart, its fragments scatter along its orbit. Through the jostling effect of collisions they fall into a flattened ring. Around 20 million years from now
Tidal forces continue to act on the ring, causing debris to sift down onto the surface and eventually draining the ring of material. 20 to 120 million years from now
Above: An artist’s impression of Mars’ future ring system, comprised of debris left over from Phobos
to form a rocky ring system around the Red Planet, similar to the icy ones seen today around planets like Saturn. “The lifetime of the ring will depend on how far Phobos is from Mars when a break-up occurs,” points out Black, “but we estimate that the ring will persist for in the ballpark of 1 to 100 million years.” Beyond tidal forces, gravity has another important role to play in the future of the Solar System – one whose effects can be remarkably hard to predict. ‘Orbital resonances’ occur when one object has an orbital period close to an exact multiple of another. This produces frequent close alignments between the two, magnifying otherwise weak gravitational forces and potentially disrupting apparently stable orbits. A present-day example would be the ‘Kirkwood gaps’ – regions of the asteroid belt between Mars and Jupiter that are empty because any object orbiting within them would be in resonance with Jupiter. But in the longer term, a different resonance with Jupiter might cause far more dramatic results. Mercury, the innermost planet, has the most eccentric orbit of all, and the long axis of this orbit
Future of the Solar System
Stellar switch The next 100,000 years will see many stars make close approaches to our Solar System, though none should come close enough to threaten the inner planets
1
2
Alpha Centauri A and B
3
Binary pair of orange and yellow dwarfs (Sun-like stars)
Proxima Centauri Red dwarf
4
“As the Sun brightens, the habitable zone will also expand, leaving Earth behind in about 1 billion years” Robert Smith
Distance from the Solar System (in light years)
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Barnard’s Star 7
an example of ‘sensitivity to initial conditions’ – better known as chaos theory – which has profound implications for any attempt to track the long-term orbits of the planets. Chaos theory doesn’t mean that a system ignores the laws of physics – only that those laws operate in such a way that tiny differences in initial parameters magnify over time until they make prediction impossible. In our Solar System this means that unless you can pin down the exact positions, orbital speeds and masses of the eight major planets and countless smaller objects with near-absolute precision, attempts to model the evolution of orbits become useless after a certain point in the future. Estimates of exactly how soon
planets one per cent of the time. The tests reveal
we ‘lose track’ of various Solar System parameters
Lalande 21185 Red dwarf
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9
Ross 248 Red dwarf
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Ross 128 12
wobbles or ‘precesses’ around the Sun at a rate of 1.5 degrees every thousand years. Jupiter’s orbit, though less eccentric, precesses at a very similar rate, which could potentially allow their orbits to line up in a resonant arrangement around 3 to 4 billion years from now. If this was to happen, Mercury’s orbit could eventually go haywire, flinging it onto a chaotic course that could send it hurtling into the Sun, or even cause it to collide with Venus or Earth. In 2009 French astronomers Jacques Laskar and Mickaël Gastineau attempted to estimate the chances of such an event happening. Over 2,500 computer simulations, each of which varied the initial position of Mercury by a metre, found that Mercury’s orbit evolved to threaten the other
Red dwarf
Red dwarf
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Point in time from now = around 36,000 years in the future (at closest approach of Ross 248)
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Gliese 445 17
Red dwarf
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Future of the Solar System x3 images © NASA
Right (clockwise): The discovery of debris discs around burnt-out white dwarfs suggests they could give rise to new planetary systems, even after destroying their old ones Arcturus, in the constellation of Boötes, is a solar-mass star some 37 light years from Earth which has recently begun its expansion into the red giant stage of its life Volcanoes on Jupiter’s moon Io are driven by heating from tidal forces, but as Io spirals away from the planet these forces will weaken and the moon will cool
range between 2 and 200 million years – beyond that point the positions of the planets and even the shape of their orbits are unpredictable using present-day models. Another complicating factor is the gravitational influence of other stars. Today the closest known star to Earth is Proxima Centauri, a small red dwarf some 4.24 light years from Earth, but astronomers have calculated the motion of other stars in the solar neighbourhood and found that several will come much closer than that in the next thousands of years – perhaps even close enough to have their own effect on the orbits of the outer planets and the icy objects of the Kuiper Belt and Oort Cloud. While we are uncertain about the destiny of the planets beyond a certain point in the future, we’re on firmer ground when it comes to the fate of the
next 4 billion years, at a rate of about one per cent every 100 million years or so. This will have severe consequences for the habitability of our own planet and others, but these consequences are nothing compared to what comes next. In about 7 billion years from now the Sun will exhaust the hydrogen fuel in its core and begin to go through a series of dramatic changes. The exhausted helium-rich core will begin to contract, releasing gravitational energy, while hydrogen fusion moves out into a surrounding shell. About half of the energy released by the contracting core is available to raise its temperature. Eventually this makes it hot enough for the helium to undergo nuclear reactions, producing carbon and oxygen, but in the short term it also heats the hydrogen-burning shell, causing fusion to run faster than it did in the
to balloon outwards and creating a bloated, brilliant monster with a surprisingly cool surface – our Sun will become a red giant. But just how large will the red giant Sun become, and will it threaten to engulf the planets that it has previously provided with light and heat? Robert Smith of the University of Sussex researched these questions with his colleague Klaus-Peter Schröder of the University of Guanajuato, Mexico, and reveals a surprising factor that complicates the question: “As the Sun becomes larger, the surface gravity also decreases, and mass is less strongly bound to the surface. Mass loss caused by the solar wind [the stream of particles blowing out from the Sun’s surface] therefore increases steadily and becomes significant. By the time that helium ignition takes place in the core, the Sun will be more than 200-
Sun itself. As it continues to shine by the process of nuclear fusion of the hydrogen in its core, the Sun will brighten slowly but steadily over the
core and increasing the Sun’s energy output at least a thousandfold. The other half of the energy drives the expansion of the Sun’s upper layers, using them
times larger than it was on the main sequence, reaching out beyond Earth’s current orbit. But it will also have lost about 20 per cent of its mass.”
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Future of the Solar System
The Solar System’s changing planets As the Sun swells to a red giant, it will have a dramatic effect on the planets and their moons
Neptune The outermost of the major planets, Neptune orbits so far from the Sun that it will never make it out of deep freeze, even when the Sun is at its biggest and brightest.
Uranus The innermost of the Solar System’s two ice giants, Uranus will experience habitable temperatures, warm enough to melt ice on the surface of its moons, for just 2 million years.
Jupiter Increased solar heating will cause Jupiter’s atmosphere to balloon in size. Its giant moons will enjoy a habitable phase lasting around 30 million years.
Saturn Saturn’s atmosphere will also expand, and its rings will likely be long gone. Its moons, including the giant Titan, may benefit from 8 million years at habitable temperatures.
Earth
Mars
The Sun’s loss of mass will send Earth’s orbit spiralling outwards, but then tidal effects will draw it back, ensuring that our planet is burnt to a cinder in the Sun’s outer layers.
Our outer neighbour will probably survive the Sun’s expansion, and could even have habitable conditions for 100 million years or so.
Venus
The Sun’s increasing brightness will blast away Venus’ thick atmosphere before swallowing up the planet itself.
Mercury If Mercury’s orbit remains stable until the Sun’s red giant phase, the innermost planet is sure to be swallowed up by the expanding star.
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Future of the Solar System
The Sun’s evolution to a black dwarf The long-term fate of the Solar System is governed by the star found at its centre. Fortunately we have several billion years before the Sun goes through any major changes As our star uses up the hydrogen fuel in its core, it brightens slowly over the next 5 billion years.
Monster star
White dwarf remnant
At its greatest extent the Sun will probably have a diameter equivalent to Earth’s current orbit.
Eventually the Sun’s core is exposed as an incandescent, slowly cooling white dwarf star. Over billions of years this fades away to become a cold black dwarf.
Growing giant
Unstable phase
As hydrogen fusion moves into shells around the core the Sun brightens and swells in size, with its surface growing cooler.
After a brief respite as the core reignites and fuses helium, the Sun swells again, entering a period of pulsations in brightness and size.
Black dwarf Due to the time it takes for them to evolve, a black dwarf has never been observed.
Shedding layers The Sun becomes ever more unstable and its outer layers are blown off to form a spectacular but short-lived planetary nebula.
Due to the Sun’s weakening gravity, the orbits of the planets will spiral outwards. The effect won’t
Source: Wikipedia Commons © Takeshi Kuboki
Left: In about 500 million years from now the Moon’s slow drift away from Earth will mean it can no longer cover the Sun’s disc in a total solar eclipse
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be enough to save Mercury or Venus if they are still near their current orbits, but it might be enough to save Earth – if not for another twist in the tale. “As the Sun expands and loses mass, its rotation rate slows down,” says Smith. “By the time it is 200-times larger than its current radius, its rotation period will be 2,500 years instead of one month. For Earth this has a drastic consequence: as it orbits past a Sun whose surface is now rather close, it raises a tidal bulge on the Sun’s surface. As it moves ahead of the bulge, this exerts a tidal drag on Earth, causing it to lose energy and spiral in towards the Sun. Interaction with the Sun’s outermost atmosphere introduces a further drag force – the combined effect of these two forces is enough to cause a fatal spiral into the Sun, and the vaporisation of Earth.” Earth, it seems, is doomed by a very similar effect to that which is currently pulling Phobos to its fate. But what would be the effect of these dramatic changes further out in the Solar System? “The increased luminosity of the Sun means that all the planets also heat up, with some of them becoming potentially habitable,” explains Smith.
© Tobias Roetsch
Ageing Sun
Future of the Solar System “There is a habitable zone in the Solar System in the form of a ring, which currently only includes
his colleagues investigated the possibility that new planets might form in the aftermath of the Sun’s
slows down. A planet orbiting at a distance of 0.01 AU will be within the habitable zone for 8 billion
Earth near its inner edge. As the Sun brightens the
burnout, and asked whether they might be able to
years from about 2 billion years after the formation
habitable zone will expand, leaving Earth behind
support life. “The idea is that the remains of these
of the white dwarf.”
in about 1 billion years. Unfortunately the habitable zone moves rather slowly for most of the Sun’s red
destroyed first-generation planets might be able to re-coalesce into a second generation of planets
Compared to ‘normal’ exoplanet systems, such white dwarf planets might be rarer. Fulton and
giant evolution, speeding up only in the last halfbillion years before helium ignition. This means that
once the star runs out of hydrogen and helium and contracts into a white dwarf,” explains Fulton. The
his colleagues carried out a survey and found that ‘super-Earths’ are expected in the habitable
Mars, for example, will only enter the habitable zone 6 billion years after Earth leaves it, and will stay in
small size of the Sun’s white dwarf remnant would make it far fainter than the present-day Sun and
zones of seven per cent of white dwarfs. That is in contrast to estimates of 15 to 20 per cent for
it for 100 million years.” Such periods are far too short for any life to
would mean that any habitable planets would need to orbit much closer in.
super-Earth planets around Sun-like stars, but there are billions of white dwarfs out there. “Our survey
evolve and take advantage of them, and before
“White dwarfs are like hot embers left after a fire
the habitable zone can reach the outer edge of the Solar System, the Sun will undergo another
goes out,” continues Fulton. “They start out bright and hot and slowly cool for the rest of eternity. This
debris, which have recently been discovered around a white dwarf,” admits Fulton. “It’s possible that
dramatic change. An event called the helium flash will see the core reignite, fusing helium into heavier
means that the orbital radius of the habitable zone around a white dwarf evolves with time. Just after
these smaller planets commonly orbit white dwarfs throughout the galaxy.” Even if the Solar System
elements. As its internal structure changes, our star will become much less luminous and shrink back
the formation of the white dwarf the habitable zone is relatively far away and evolving very rapidly,
as we know it is doomed to die when the Sun expands into a red giant in 7 billion years’ time,
rapidly, taking the habitable zone with it. Helium burning may last for about 100 million years before
but as the white dwarf ages the distance to the habitable zone moves inward and the evolution
it’s comforting to imagine a new system of strange planets orbiting our burnt-out star in the future.
was not sensitive to smaller planets or asteroidal
the core’s supply of that fuel is also exhausted. After swelling to a red giant once again, the Sun will become unstable, discarding its outer layers in a small planetary nebula and ultimately leaving behind just the burnt-out, incandescently hot planet-sized core – a white dwarf. Is that the end for our Solar System? Remarkably, recent work by astronomers at the University of Hawaii suggests it might not be. Ben J. Fulton and
“Earth, it seems, is doomed by a very similar effect to that which is currently pulling Mars’ moon Phobos to its fate”
Colonising the Solar System
Year likely to happen
Type of habitat
Earth has a few billion years left before the brightening Sun makes its surface uninhabitable, so where could we go next?
Temperature at time of colonisation
Atmospheric constituents at time of colonisation
Mars
Callisto
iitan
2050
2100
2200
2300
-180°C to 120°C (-292°F to 248°F)
-55°C (-67°F)
-140°C (-220°F)
-180°C (-292°F)
Pressurised environment
Pressurised environment or terraformed planet
Pressurised environment
Pressurised environment
No atmosphere – however, this means that environmental conditions on the Moon will change less dramatically than they will back here on Earth.
Carbon dioxide – but planetary engineering could trigger a greenhouse effect and release trapped ice, warming the planet to produce breathable air.
None. Callisto would remain too cold to terraform until the Sun enters its red giant phase, but is the safest of all Jupiter’s moons in terms of radiation risk.
Nitrogen and methane – although it will remain deep frozen for billions of years, Titan has a thick atmosphere and many resources to support a human colony. © NASA
The Moon
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Future tech Satellite repair droids
SATELLITE REPAIR DROIDS
Lightweight
What to do when an outer space satellite breaks down? Send in the robots!
D
roids could soon be placed on satellites in geostationary orbit (GEO) around Earth to make the job
of repairing and maintaining them much easier – and cheaper. The Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency (DARPA) is looking at the possibility of installing robots on satellites before they are launched into orbit. Once on board the droids would be responsible for a number of tasks, including inspecting the satellites, fixing any problems and performing orbit adjustments. This project, named Phoenix, would slash the cost of dealing with problems of satellites that orbit at a distance of 35,400 kilometres (22,000 miles) above Earth. Satellites operating in a low-Earth orbit (LEO) are able to be repaired by conventional means because they are within easy reach of Earth, but the height of the geostationary satellites means that any repair missions are impossible with current technology. Establishing a droid on a satellite before launch would enable scientists on Earth to affect a remote repair. This would increase the life expectancy of the satellites, as damaged satellites could be repaired rather than ditched. DARPA is asking for assistance in developing the technology, having already completed Phase 1 of the Phoenix project, which was a feasibility study into what actions the droids could perform in space. Phase 2 will be the development of three main areas of technology. The first is droids that can repair satellites, using robotic arms to carry out tasks. The second is the development of satlets, which are modular satellite architecture that can carry out similar roles to satellites. The final technology being developed as part of the Phoenix project is a Payload Orbital Delivery (POD) system, which is a mechanism that can carry essential items
22
On-board repairs The droid will be sent up with the satellite as part of its payload to ensure it is there when it is needed.
Inspection Part of the droid’s role will be to inspect the satellite for any physical or technological damage. This will give an accurate reading of the required procedures.
The droid will be significantly smaller and lighter than the satellite. Although this does add weight to the launch, it improves efficiency overall.
Satellite repair droids Private and public This technology would be designed to be used on both private and military satellites, which is why DARPA is asking for outside help.
Inside the satellite It will be able to perform its task by manipulating the electrical systems inside the satellite, rather than physically moving it.
Adjustments The droid will be able to move the satellite when it comes to the end of its service to make room for further missions in geostationary orbit.
Mechanic
Toolbox They will have robotic arms to perform the repairs as well as a supply of spare parts that can replace any faulty or damaged sections of the satellite.
into space along with the satellite. These three areas are being looked at by a number of private companies, who will construct models and report back to DARPA with their findings. The GEO satellites need to be that far away from Earth because that is the distance at which they are able to be in geosynchronous orbit with the planet. This is where the satellite orbits at the same time as Earth spins, so it is always over the same point. There are currently over 900 satellites in GEO over the equator, which is another important role that the droids could perform. The space around the equator
cycle the droid could shift the satellite’s orbit, which would allow another satellite to take its place and reduce the risk of a collision. As more and more satellites are being launched every year, the need for a reliable and comparatively cheap method of repairing them is becoming increasingly important. This project from DARPA could potentially be extremely important, as it could massively reduce the cost of repairing satellites. If the technology behind the Phoenix project is successful, it could be rolled out to other spacecraft and probes, extending their lives and enabling us to explore
is becoming crowded, so at the end of their life
even further reaches of the galaxy.
© Adrian Mann
It will also act as an on-board mechanic, correcting mechanical and physical problems in situ. This will be the first time satellites in GEO could be repaired in space.
23
Destination: Alpha Centauri
DESTINATION
CENTAURI Some of the world’s top scientists are looking to reach for our nearest stars Reported by David Crookes
24
Destination: Alpha Centauri
I
f you gaze into the night sky from Earth’s Southern Hemisphere, you should be able to catch sight of our nearest stellar neighbour, Alpha
Centauri. It appears to the naked eye as a single, brightly glowing celestial object and has long been a source of fascination for astronomers. Alpha Centauri was discovered to be a binary star system in 1689, made up of Alpha Centauri A and
“With the lightest spacecraft ever built, we can launch a mission to Alpha Centauri within a generation” Stephen Hawking
However, there has been some doubt cast over more recent theories about the star system. In October
and gather other scientific data before sending the
2012 a team of European observers claimed to have evidence of an exoplanet orbiting Alpha Centauri B,
information back down to Earth. The research and engineering program would enable many of today’s
and yet, almost exactly three years later, the theory
scientists to search for extraterrestrial life, seek
was dismissed by a group of astronomers at Oxford University. Other theories relating to exoplanets
exoplanets and maybe even discover an Earth-like body in a habitable zone. It would also prove useful
within the star system are similarly up in the air. The key issue with Alpha Centauri is that it is
in quickly exploring planets and other bodies far closer to home. The potential is huge.
4.37 light years away, and while Proxima Centauri is closer, it is still distant by a just-as-daunting 4.24
So why has this possibility only just emerged? The answer lies in many of our pockets: within
light years. Travelling to the star system would entail a journey of some 40 trillion kilometres (25 trillion miles), and with current spacecraft speeds, like NASA’s Parker Solar Probe, you’d have to be travelling for more than 6,300 years to reach it. It’s no surprise so few have seriously considered launching a craft that would, quite literally, reach for the stars. Yet that is just what a group of some of the world’s most respected scientists and engineers are now hoping to do in their bid to vault into the interstellar age. Advances in technology, combined with the financial backing of Russian entrepreneur and physicist Yuri Milner, are set to place what was felt to be the impossible very much on the table
our smartphones and tablets. Moore’s law has meant that the size of microelectronic components has vastly decreased thanks to nanotechnology advances and the incredible demand for smaller, smarter consumer devices. If you pulled apart an iPhone and discarded the screen and casing, you would see that the basic driving force behind it is not only light in weight but small in size. It’s on this principle that the nanocrafts will be built. The so-called StarChip will be a small ‘wafer’ of around 25 millimetres (0.9 inches) in size and will weigh less than one gram (0.04 ounces). Yet it will be capable of carrying the key components of a robotic probe; that is a camera – or indeed
of possibility. “The problem is, space travel as we know it is slow,” says Milner. “If Voyager had left our planet when humans first left Africa, travelling at 18 kilometres (11 miles) per second, it would be arriving at Alpha Centauri just about now. How do we go faster and how do we go further? How do we make this next leap?” In 2015 Milner and Stephen Hawking created the privately funded company, Breakthrough Initiatives. Almost immediately it launched a program called Breakthrough Listen, which heralded a cash-rich search for alien life beyond the Solar System. Now, with Facebook founder Mark Zuckerberg also on board, it has unveiled a new project: Breakthrough Starshot. Its aim is to develop a craft and propellant system capable of reaching Alpha Centauri just 20 years after launch. The central idea of Starshot is to send a fleet of tiny probes called nanocrafts deep into the more remote regions of space. It would involve shooting a powerful laser beam to propel them to one-fifth of the speed of light. When they reach
four – power supply, thrusters and both navigation and communication equipment. They will be so tiny and eventually so relatively inexpensive to make that hundreds or maybe thousands of them are intended to be placed within a mothership and
their destination the probes will be able to take photographs of the celestial bodies they encounter
Below: Some of the best individual brains in science, engineering and aerospace are working on the Breakthrough Starshot project
© Breackthrough Initiatives Group
© Tobias Roetsch
Alpha Centauri B, and in 1915 a fainter star called Proxima Centauri was observed relatively close by.
25
Destination: Alpha Centauri
British Astronomer Royal Martin Rees shares his thoughts on studying the system Is there anything special
Destination Alpha Centauri Alpha Centauri A
Alpha Centauri B The star is not alone. It is part of a binary star system that includes Alpha Centauri B – a star slightly smaller than our Sun but with half its luminosity and a lower temperature.
The fourth-brightest star that can be seen from Earth. It is 4.37 light years away and 1.1 times the mass of our Sun, but with a luminosity 1.52 times our own star’s.
about Alpha Centauri? It’s a binary star where the separation is about the
A discovered planet A world called Proxima Centauri b was discovered by astronomers in August 2016, orbiting parent star Proxima Centauri. The aim is for Starshot’s probes to perform a flyby.
distance between the Sun and Neptune. But I think for most astronomers it’s the study of exoplanets that is
the last 10 or 20 years. Why is there interest in Alpha Centauri? Some of us want to study the stars and some of us want to get detailed images of planets around stars. The main scientific goal is to find Earth-like planets. We didn’t know until five years ago that most stars have planets around them. That makes it more interesting. Could the focus move away from Alpha Centauri once the Starshot project is ready to launch? Long before we launch these probes, I suspect we’ll have learned enough about all of the nearby stars to know which ones have the most interesting planets around them. Before it’s possible to launch anything we would know if Alpha Centauri was the best target. We would have enough information to make that decision.
A third star A faint red dwarf star called Proxima Centauri is our closest star – about 4.25 light years from the Sun.
© ESO
especially interesting because that has only opened up in
rocketed into space. The sheer numbers will allow for a large margin of error, ensuring that at least some of them will succeed in reaching their target. It sounds throwaway, but having more than one device flung into space also opens up the possibility of having different instruments on different StarChips, widening the scope of the collectable data. In all of this, Breakthrough Initiatives says it is bringing “the Silicon Valley approach to space travel,” and it is hard to argue against that. But it’s only part of the story. Although work has already begun in prototyping the miniaturisation of the spacecraft – notably by researcher and aerospace engineer Zac Manchester – the rest of the program hinges on having something that can not only create forward propulsion, but also get the probes to the desired speed. For this an extremely thin, one square metre (10.8 square foot) sail will open shortly after the nanocrafts have been launched from their mothership. The StarChips will then literally sail to their destination. Using sails in space is not a new idea. Johannes Kepler wrote to Galileo about this very concept in 1610, and exactly 400 years later the Japanese spacecraft IKAROS became the first to successfully use a solar sail that unfolded slowly to an area of 32 square metres (344 square foot). Sails can take advantage of the Sun’s wind to propel a spacecraft forward
26
Source: Wikipedia Commons © Skatebiker
Why should we go to Alpha Centauri?
with a push of photons. Indeed, so well-known is the power of photons that they were even used to balance the Kepler Space Telescope. Here though, the idea begins to sound like it has been ripped from the pages of a science-fiction novel. The problem with relying on the Sun to produce the required force to propel the StarChip to one-fifth of the speed of light is that our star isn’t forceful enough to do this, so the Starshot scientists are looking to use a powerful laser beam instead. The beam will shoot out towards the probes and hit their light sails with a torrent of photons. It is this that will cause them to accelerate to a blistering speed in the microgravity vacuum of space. Within two minutes the nanocrafts will be as far as 965,600 kilometres (600,000 miles) from home and well on their way to their target. “With light beams, light sails and the lightest spacecraft ever built, we can launch a mission to Alpha Centauri within a generation,” said Professor Hawking. That’s not to say any of this will be straightforward. It could take a decade, maybe two, to even get the technology to a stage where a launch is actually possible. “It’s a very complex program,” Professor Philip Lubin of the University of California, Santa Barbara tells us. “You don’t want to go into this assuming everything is simple because it’s not. We know how to do many of the things, but there are many things we don’t. Some will require development over years, which is why we’re
Stephen Hawking
Yuri Milner
Ann Druyan
Former director of research at the University of Cambridge
Founder of DST Global
Author, producer and specialist in science communication
Notable achievements: One of the greatest scientists of all time, he helped to advance the Big Bang theory. His well-known book A Brief History of Time has sold over 10 million copies.
Notable achievements: The Russian entrepreneur and physicist has invested in numerous tech businesses such as Facebook, Twitter and Spotify.
Notable achievements: Selected the music included with Voyager 1 and 2, co-writer of the 1980 PBS documentary series Cosmos and producer and writer of Cosmos: A Spacetime Odyssey.
Involvement in Project Starshot: Funding Breakthrough Initiatives. “The human story is one of great leaps – 55 years ago, Yuri Gagarin became the first human in space. Today we are preparing for the next great leap – to the stars.”
Involvement in Project Starshot: Board member of Breakthrough Initiatives.
Notable achievements: His scientific paper A Roadmap To Interstellar Flight details the feasibility of a gram-level spacecraft travelling at one-fifth of the speed of light. Involvement in Project Starshot: Working on directed energy propulsion. “Using the technology we’re speaking about, we can get to Voyager, which has been travelling for over 42 years, in a day or so”
Martin Rees British Astronomer Royal Notable achievements: Master of Trinity College, Cambridge, president of the Royal Society and cofounder of the Centre for the Study of Existential Risk. Involvement in Project Starshot: Member of the Breakthrough Starshot Management and Advisory Committee and leader of Breakthrough Listen. “We’d all like to find ET in our lifetime – it would be the greatest discovery of all time.”
Freeman Dyson Former professor emeritus at Princeton Notable achievements: Known for his work in quantum electrodynamics, solid-state physics, astronomy and nuclear engineering. Involvement in Project Starshot: Former member of Breakthrough Starshot’s Management and Advisory Committee. “This is part of the whole process of exploring the universe, which is something that we are pretty good at.”
© AIAA
© Breackthrough Initiatives Group
Notable achievements: Former NASA astronaut who flew on board Space Shuttle Endeavour in September 1992.
Zac Manchester Researcher and aerospace engineer; founder of KickSat project Notable achievements: A graduate researcher in aerospace engineering at Cornell University with a number of scientific interests. He also created the world’s smallest satellite. Involvement in Project Starshot: Assisting on prototype StarChip.
“Collectively we are, as humans, at a point in which technologically there is at least one feasible path to getting us to another star within our generation.”
“There is a big difference between physically exploring space regions and looking at them from a distance.”
© Breackthrough Initiatives Group
Philip Lubin
Mae Jemison Principal of the 100 Year Starship organisation
“This kind of thinking that looks at a horizon 20, 35 or 50 years away is exactly what is called for now.”
Involvement in Project Starshot: Member of the Breakthrough Starshot Management and Advisory Committee.
Involvement in Project Starshot: Chairman of the Breakthrough Starshot Advisory Committee.
“Our nearest star, Alpha Centauri, is 4.3 light years or about 25 trillion miles [40 trillion kilometres] away. Even with today’s fastest spacecraft, it would take 6,300 years to get there. That’s too long.”
Professor of physics at the University of California
Notable achievements: Author of over 700 scientific papers and four astrophysics and cosmology books. One of the 25 most influential people in space according to TIME magazine.
© Breackthrough Initiatives Group
Notable achievements: Creation of the world’s largest online social network.
Avi Loeb Professor of science at Harvard University
© Breackthrough Initiatives Group
Founder and CEO of Facebook
Source: Wikipediea Commons © JD Lasica
“Sooner or later, we must look to the stars. Starshot is an exciting first step on that journey.”
Mark Zuckerberg
Involvement in Project Starshot: Member of the Breakthrough Starshot Management and Advisory Committee.
“Moore’s law is making the sensors, tiny computers, radios and all the components we need to build the spacecraft available.
© NASA
Involvement in Project Starshot: Former board member of Breakthrough Initiatives.
Source: Wikipediea Commons © Monroem
eakth the The Br has some of ential u l f project n i t d mos n a t s ience, e c b s m o r f e figures and aerospac raft ering c e e n c i a g p n s e on the her than g n i k r wo ch furt a e r l l i that w fore ever be
© Breackthrough Initiatives Group
© Getty
Who’esd? involrv rshot a t S h g ou
© Breackthrough Initiatives Group
Destination: Alpha Centauri
Pete Worden Executive director of Breakthrough Starshot Notable achievements: Former director of NASA’s Ames Research Center and author of more than 150 scientific papers. Involvement in Project Starshot: Leading the Starshot program. “We take inspiration from Vostok, Voyager, Apollo and the other great missions. It’s time to open the era of interstellar flight, but we need to keep our feet on the ground too.”
27
Destination: Alpha Centauri Multiple launch Hundreds or maybe thousands of StarChips will be sent into space at the same time by the launcher.
Sailing across the universe The nanocrafts will carry a light sail measuring one metre squared (10.8 square feet) – large enough to capture the incoming laser beam.
The Launcher
How will we get there? Since the StarChips are tiny, hundreds or maybe even thousands of them will be sent to the mission’s target, providing ample cover for those that fail to make it for any reason. They will be packed inside a rocket-propelled orbiting mothership and released. But here is where the true magic happens. Improvements in photonics will make it possible for phased arrays of lasers – each of which will be placed in a particularly arid Earth-based location such as the Atacama Desert – to fire a cumulative 100-gigawatt beam at the nanocrafts. This will propel them forward at speeds approaching one-fifth of the speed of light.
Lightweight Both the StarChip and the light sail – which will be just a few hundred atoms thick and made of metamaterials – will weigh less than one gram (0.04 ounces).
The listener
How we’ll communicate Beam them up © Adrian Mann
Earth-based lasers create a single powerful beam that will point at the StarChips, accelerating them to 160.9 million kilometres (100 million miles) per hour.
28
According to Pete Worden, the executive director of Breakthrough Starshot, one of the major challenges is working out how the probes will be able to communicate with investigators on Earth. Small lasers powered by a fraction of a watt could be carried on board the StarChip, and the light sail could be reconfigured as an optical element. The lasers would send out a signal and the Earthbased transmitting laser array would reverse their role, picking up on the communications. The images would take four years to be received.
Destination: Alpha Centauri going into a long-term development program.” This part of the program relies heavily on advances in photonics, the science of light generation, detection and manipulation. Lubin is at the forefront of this study, and it was he who detailed how photonics would play its part in spacecraft propulsion in a 66-page academic paper written in 2015 called A Roadmap To Interstellar Flight. The paper forms the basis of Starshot, and it says scientists and engineers need to fundamentally change their thinking of both propulsion and what a spacecraft is. It also says that changes in directed-energy technology mean that the idea of photon propulsion is no longer fantasy. The potential rewards are great. Lubin points out that there is a rich environment to explore with more than 150 stars within 20 light years of the Sun. He says at least 17 of them appear capable of supporting planets that could contain life. But the scale of the task is immense. Rather than build a single laser, the idea is to create an array of phased light beams – numerous small lasers forming a single powerful light stretching more than 0.8 kilometres (0.5 miles). There are
Reflective coating It is important that the light sail is highly reflective so that it doesn’t absorb the laser beams that are aimed at it. It may be used to focus communication signals from an antenna on the StarChip back to Earth.
Power point The StarChip The StarChip will be a thin slice of semiconductor material – or wafer – carrying four miniature two-megapixel cameras, photon thrusters and navigation and communication equipment.
Actual size
The StarChip will also contain a power supply. At this stage, americium is being considered – an artificially produced yet slowly decaying radioisotope used in smoke detectors.
The nanocraft © NASA
What is StarChip?
two reasons for this. First, to be effective the beam would ideally have to scale to 100 gigawatts and, as Lubin tells us, “we don’t know how to make a single 100-gigawatt laser”. Second, he continues, “even if we did there are reasons you wouldn’t want to do that – you’d still need a beam director and a large area”. For this reason, it makes sense to spread it out. “Even if someone handed you a 100-gigawatt laser that you could hold in your hand, you’d still need a large one-kilometre (0.6-mile) telescope to couple it to, because you have to form a spot at long distances with a large aperture,” Lubin explains. Yet, he adds, “no one has ever built an array like that of this size, and there are a lot of issues relating to it which we will have to discover along the way.” But there are some clear benefits of using this system of propulsion. There would be no need for the nanocrafts to have fuel on board – which helps to keep them light – and the lasers can be recharged, whereas rocket fuel would be spent. Engineers would seek efficiencies, so steps would be taken to make optimum use of the laser beams, too: adaptive optics in the form of deformable mirrors would attempt to combat any atmospheric blurring caused by the dispersal of light, and the array would be positioned in a location to give it a better ‘view’ of the probes. “There will be a large element in the first decade to work out a lot of the risk,” Lubin continues. “And there will be a lot of political issues.” Not to mention costs: “$100 million (£81.2 million) will get us to prototype stage, but not to a system,” he adds. Some figures suggest $100 billion (£81.2 billion) will eventually be needed to see the program to fruition, and that could be a sticking point in the future. But there are some persuasive arguments for going
29
Destination: Alpha Centauri the journey
Space checkpoints StarChip will hit several targets along the way The Moon Distance: 384,400 kilometres (238,855 miles) Times around the world: 9.6
1 min
The Sun Distance: 149.6 million kilometres (92.9 million miles) Times around the world: 3,737
41 mins
Mars Distance: 54.5 million kilometres (33.9 million miles) Times around the world: 1,361
1 hour
Pluto Distance: 4.3 billion kilometres (2.6 billion miles) Times around the world: 107,400
1 day
The Solar System’s edge Distance: 7.4 trillion kilometres (4.6 trillion miles) Times around the world: 185 million
4 years
ahead with it. As well as being able to boldly go where no human-made object has ventured before,
photos back. I would have thought that the issue of how good the pictures are and the rate of data
the bonus of having such powerful lasers projecting
transmission back, given a very low power, will
into space – even for the mere minutes they’ll actually be in operation – is that the light from the
pose a big challenge.” All of this, however, is why the project is likely
lasers will be detectable all across the universe. If intelligent life is out there, a civilisation may well
to take so long to figure out, and the program is not looking to hide the challenges. It points out
spot it and respond.
the risk of interstellar dust collisions, for instance,
Even so, some astronomers – including those heavily involved in the search for extraterrestrial
and highlights issues in focusing a light beam on the light sail to accelerate individual nanocrafts. At
life – do have their reservations. “I personally think that it’s very ambitious, and I wouldn’t bet high
the same time, new technologies will emerge that enhance techniques in communication and optics
horses that it will ever be done,” British cosmologist, astrophysicist and Astronomer Royal Martin Rees
and will be of wider benefit to the space industry. But despite the challenges, the program appears
tells us. “All that has been done at the moment is to explore the feasibility of something that would
in good hands. As well as having some of the best individual brains in science, engineering and
cost many billions of dollars to actually do.” Lord
aerospace on the job, universities and research
Rees questions whether the money might be better spent building huge telescopes in space, and he
centres are involved too. Breakthrough Starshot is also throwing the doors open to the public and will
also raises two problems the Starshot team will be keen to resolve. “With the huge array you can send
be encouraging scientific investment with research grants. The team wants the process to be open and
something to the nearest star in 20 years, but the probes can’t slow down when they get there. They
transparent, and Breakthrough Initiatives is strictly non-profit. In the longer term Milner hopes to
just fly past,” he says. “This is a constraint, and I think that is something we have to clarify. The whole thing also weighs less than one gram (0.04 ounces) so how would it be able to transmit the data back?” According to Pete Worden, who is directing the project, these issues will be addressed. The current thinking is that lasers could be fitted on board the probes to beam images back to the laser array, which could be turned into a receiver. But as Lord Rees says: “The Pluto flyby was slower and not nearly as far away, but it took a year to transmit
work with NASA and the ESA, both of which have been briefed and will inevitably look closely at the progress being made. Ultimately it comes down to the mantra of nothing ventured, nothing gained. There are more benefits to be had in trying: “If this mission comes to fruition, it will tell us as much about ourselves as about Alpha Centauri,” Milner says. “Only by challenging ourselves can we find out if we, like the pioneers before us, have the ability and ambition to succeed. For the first time in human history we can do more than just gaze at the stars, we can actually reach them. It’s time to launch the next great leap.”
Alpha Centauri Distance: 40.2 trillion kilometres (25 trillion miles) Times around the world: 1,004 million
20 years
Need for speed StarChip
Below: A model of the Japanese interplanetary unmanned spacecraft IKAROS
Speed: 160.9 million kph (100 million mph) Mass: Under one gram (0.04 ounces) Time to edge of the Solar System: Four years y
Speed: 58,536kph (36,373mph) Mass: 470 kilograms (1,036 pound ds) Time to edge of the Solar System m: Ten years
Voyager 1 Speed: 61,000kph (38,000mph)) Mass: 733 kilograms (1,616 poun s) Time to edge of the Solar Syste em: 35
30
rs
Source: Wikipediea Commons© Pavel Hrdlička
New Horizons
60 SECOND SCIENCE
Welcome to 60 Second Science. This fact-packed guide introduces fundamental principles iin physics, h sics biology and chem chemistry y with clear, concise explanations, infographics and illustrations. From the Big Bang to quantum mechanics and from fossils to Wi-Fi, you’ll be up to speed with the latest breakthroughs in no time. Throughout the book you’ll also have the opportunity to put these theories into practice with some easy-to-follow experiments. See how circuits work with batteries made from lemons, detect Earth’s magnetic field by making your own compass, learn how to instantly freeze water with a single touch and much more. What are you waiting for? Dive in to discover how the wonderful world around you works.
HOW IT WORKS BOOK OF SPACE
Space has h fascinated humankind from earliest days of civilisation, and as we keep scratching the surface of the vast universe in f and won continues to grow unabated. Now, with the technological advancements being made by the world’s space agencies, we understand more than ever about the things that are happening beyond our own planet. This new edition of the How It Works Book of Space has been updated with more of the latest astronomical advancements, stunning space photography from the most advanced telescopes on the planet and glimpses at what the future of space exploration holds, taking you from the heart of our Solar System and out into deep space.
SAVE THE WORLD
We’re on the precipice of destroying our home planet forever, and acttion needs to be taken to save it – even on a sm mall scale. Use the information in in this interactive journal to identify areas in your life where you can make more ecofriendly choices, and track your habits with our interactive spreads. It’s a statistical miracle that Earth has maintained its habitability in order to accommodate life for billions of years, so it’s worth seeing what you can do to keep the planet this way for a while longer. Throughout the book you’ll also notice 11 ‘myths’ – these pages bust common misconceptions about climate change and reveal the truth behind these lies. Bear these in mind in the future – you never know when you’ll have to correct someone!
Download yours now at: www.surveymonkey.co.uk/r/TMP2KVL 31
Could the Higgs destroy us?
© Tobias Roetsch
THE HIGGS BOSON
32
Could the Higgs destroy us?
Could the God Particle cause space and time to collapse, as supposedly quoted by Stephen Hawking? Reported by Kulvinder Singh Chadha
T
he universe could collapse into oblivion at any moment, the culprit being related to a recently discovered
particle. The Higgs particle, known as the Higgs boson, was discovered in 2012 by the ATLAS and CMS detectors – A Toroidal LHC ApparatuS and the Compact Muon Solenoid respectively – of the Large Hadron Collider (LHC). The LHC is a huge particle accelerator, 27 kilometres (16.7 miles) in circumference, located underground at the European Organization for Nuclear Research (CERN) in Geneva, Switzerland. The existence of the Higgs particle was first predicted by a group of scientists including Peter Higgs, who won a Nobel Prize for the discovery alongside François Englert in 2013. They used the Standard Model to make their prediction, which scientists have been using as a guide to the discovery of new particles since the 1960s. The Higgs was included in those early days, but very few thought that it could ever be found. The Higgs field gives matter particles – and also the Higgs boson – mass. However, scientists were somewhat torn on the discovery of the Higgs boson.
Big Bang 0.00 seconds Widely considered to be the beginning of our universe. This point contains all of time and space, all of the universe’s fundamental forces and is made of pure energy.
Inflation
Quarks and hadrons
10-38 seconds
10-10 seconds
A brief and rapid period of expansion of the universe begins, thought to be a consequence of the strong nuclear force becoming distinct.
The expanding universe cools enough for fundamental matter particles to form. These will combine into protons and neutrons as the universe nears its first second of existence.
33
Could the Higgs destroy us? Many were astounded and elated by it, while others were somewhat disappointed that the Standard Model didn’t turn up something more unexpected and interesting. However, it turns out that the Higgs may be exciting enough. One of the most famous scientists in the world, the late, great Stephen Hawking, purportedly suggested that the Higgs particle would eventually destroy the universe and everything in it, although others previously made similar claims. However, Hawking’s supposed claim garnered wide publicity in 2014 in the mainstream media and largely went unquestioned. Except that this was a misquote and was based on a subtle but important scientific
Right: Professor Peter Higgs, who the particle was named after, visits the CMS experiment in Switzerland Below: The Higgs field is not the same as the Higgs boson, as some media suggested
misunderstanding. From the Starmus Festival in Tenerife, Hawking explained: “The Higgs potential has the worrisome feature that it might become metastable at energies above 100 [billion] gigaelectronvolts (GeV). This © CERN
means that the universe could undergo catastrophic vacuum decay, with a bubble of the true vacuum expanding at the speed of light. This could happen at any time and we wouldn’t see it coming.”
“The true vacuum would be the lowest energy state, and a universe permeated by a Higgs field may not be in that state”
but it wouldn’t be the case. This is what the ‘false vacuum’ – which can seem like the true vacuum – means. Could our universe be on an unstable ‘mound’ with a danger of collapsing to a lower energy ground state? And would the Higgs field
collapse at any time. Although Hawking didn’t mention the Higgs particle, he did mention the Higgs field and vacuum decay. So what exactly is this phenomenon he spoke of? The vacuum of space isn’t a true vacuum. The true vacuum would be the lowest energy state, and a universe permeated by a Higgs field may not be in that state. As an analogy, imagine that the true vacuum is like the bottom of a depression, where it isn’t possible to go any lower. Now imagine d within that our universe is on a mound this depression, with a danger of o collapsing. It may appear to us that we are in the lowest state,
be responsible for that? Some scientists share Hawking’s views on this. Dr Joseph Lykken of Fermilab, Illinois, said at the 2013 meeting for the American Association for the Advancement of Science: “There’s a calculation you can do in the Standard Model once you know the mass of the Higgs. If you use all the physics we know and do this straightforward calculation, it’s bad news.” He explains how the calculation shows how quantum fluc fluctuations could be created; this could tip thee vacuum into a lower energy state by y creating bubbles. These bubbles t veel at the speed of light and tra First nuclei wou uld cause the known universe 180 seconds
As the expanding universe cools further, the sea of protons and neutrons form atomic nuclei. Largely this is hydrogen and helium, possibly with some lithium.
34
© CERN
Although this sounds frightening, it is actually different from what media reported Hawking had said back in 2014. Gigaelectronvolts and megaelectronvolts (MeV) are how particle physicists quantify the masses of subatomic particles. As an example, the proton would be around one GeV in mass, and the Higgs boson is about 125 GeV. Hawking was talking about the Higgs field – which permeates all of space – and not the Higgs particle, which is related, but different. Imagine an electron and an electric field; two things that are clearly related, but different. Catastrophic vacuum decay means that the universe may not be in its true ‘ground’ state and may be about to
Could the Higgs destroy us?
What is the Higgs boson? This particle was discovered in 2012 and mediates mass via an energy field
Finding hints of the Higgs
Mass and matter Matter particles, such as those that constitute atoms, contain mass. These particles come in two categories – quarks and leptons – while forces such as electromagnetism are carried by bosons.
Was mass mediated by the Higgs boson? That’s what the Large Hadron Collider tried to find out by using electromagnetic fields to
Atom
Neutrons
Protons
Quarks
whip beams of protons around and around to nearly the speed of light. When these protons collide, energy is released and new particles are made – which can provide evidence for the Higgs gg boson!
Nucleus
Proton
Higgs compared to other particles The mass of a particle is given in electronvolts, the energy an electron has when it’s accelerated through one volt. The Higgs boson has a mass of about 125 billion electronvolts, while the photon has no mass.
When particles collide, excess bosons or quarks may appear. How? They were formed from the Higgs boson.
Higgs boson
Top quark
Mass: 125 billion electronvolts
Mass: 170 billion electronvolts
Bottom quark
Proton
Mass: 4.2 billion electronvolts
Mass: 938 million electronvolts
Electron
Neutron
Mass: 0.5 million electronvolts
Mass: 940 million electronvolts
Higgs: why matter has mass Particles may be more massive than one another because they feel the Higgs field differently. It’s because of the Higgs boson that matter has mass.
Meeting the Higgs field
Enter ordinary matter
High-speed photons
The Higgs field occurs everywhere and gives matter particles mass. We can imagine the Higgs field as a group of evenly separated balls for this scenario.
When a particle of ordinary matter moves through the Higgs field, the field becomes excited and forms Higgs bosons, which cluster around the particle and provide it with mass.
Particles can move through space without interacting with the Higgs field. They don’t gain any mass from Higgs bosons and remain massless. A
Dark Ages First atoms
380,000 to
380,000 years
300 million years
Free electrons combine with the hydrogen, helium and lithium nuclei to form atomic versions of the primordial elements. The dense ‘fog’ lifts as a result and the universe becomes transparent.
The universe remains dark for the next 299,620,000 years as primordial atomic hydrogen, helium and lithium atoms do nothing.
35
Understanding the Higgs and the universe’s destruction It took two detectors at the LHC to find the Higgs boson 4 Muon detectors Detecting the charged particles known as muons is an important task for ATLAS. The muon is similar to an electron, but 200-times more massive. Decay into muons is one of the ‘signatures’ of the Higgs boson.
© Nicholas Forder
Could the Higgs destroy us?
3
1 LHC Accelerator ring A large vacuum tube accelerates protons via powerful electromagnets to nearlight speed.
5 Shielding
1 2 2 ATLAS
3 CMS
Collision detector
Compact Muon Solenoid
With solenoid magnets and radiation trackers, ATLAS can detect different particles from beam collisions.
Using different technologies, the CMS confirmed ATLAS’ detection of the Higgs boson.
4
6 5
10
11
7 Forward calorimeters
This calorimeter measures the energy of electrons and photons as they interact with matter.
9 Inner detector The first part of ATLAS to see the decay products of particle collisions. The inner detector is very compact and highly sensitive.
10 Solenoid
11 Barrel toroid
The ATLAS detector at CERN is equipped with a superconducting magnet. Its solenoid rests at the heart of the experiment, providing a field of two tesla sla. sla
ATLAS’ barrel toroid consists of eight coils, each made of two flat superconducting double pancakes.
Expansion accelerates First stars
8.8 billion years
300 million years
Since its inception the universe has been constantly expanding, but now it starts accelerating. The phenomenon behind this isn’t known, but has been labelled ‘dark energy’.
Gravity eventually corrals the gaseous hydrogen and helium into galaxies and protostellar discs. These eventually collapse into the first stars.
Present day 13.8 billion years Several generations of stars have created complex elements in their cores, which have then scattered in supernovae explosions to create planets and life.
© Adrian Mann
8 Electromagnetic calorimeters
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7
8
6 Hadronic calorimeters The Hadron Calorimeter (HCAL) measures the energy of hadrons – particles made of quarks – and gluons, for example protons and neutrons.
9
© NASA
Could the Higgs destroy us? Right: Far into the future, star forming will cease, galaxies will die, and the Higgs may take over
“For such a massive particle to exist, the Higg ield must possess quite a lot of energy” to collapse into a lower energy state, effectively
apart. The nature of this phenomenon is unknown
replacing it with another universe. As bizarre and scary as this sounds, Lykken reassures us that the
to us, but is called dark energy. This isn’t really of any concern to us today, but imagine that far into
chances of this happening are truly astronomical and depend on the particular cosmological epoch. He says that if it does happen, most likely it’ll take 10,100 years anyway, “so you probably shouldn’t sell your house and [should] continue to pay your taxes”. By that time our Solar System and even our galaxy will be long gone, as all starforming in the universe would stop and all of the stars would die out, leaving nothing but a dark void. Although there’s nothing to worry about, the Higgs destroying the universe is still an extremely slim possibility. What’s more, the universe could be complicit in this, but how? When the universe began around 13.8 billion years ago – a figure that comes from NASA’s Wilkinson Microwave Anisotropy Probe (WMAP) – it expanded and grew ever larger at a decelerating rate. This expansion continues to this day. However, observations from the late 1990s showed that this expansion started to accelerate around 5 billion years ago. Some powerful, unknown force, which actually makes up roughly 70 per cent of the energy density of the universe universe, is pushing space sp
the future the Higgs field starts to dominate an already-expanding universe and helps to destabilise it. Why should the Higgs behave like this at all? With 125 GeV, the Higgs boson is a massive particle – much more so than the proton. For such a massive particle to exist, the Higgs field must possess a lot of energy. Einstein revealed in his paper on special relativity in 1905 that mass and energy are two sides of the same coin. This manifests itself in the famous equation E=mc2. The Standard Model claims that massive particles are ‘metastable’, which means that they hover between stability and instability. According to Einstein’s equation, related quantum fields would take a lot of energy to create particles of such mass. A change in the Higgs field could even change the mass of every particle in the universe, assuming they still existed in the future. “Then all the laws of physics change and everything is torn apart,” says Dr Tim Barklow of the SLAC National Accelerator Laboratory in California, and a member of the ATLAS team at the LHC. Does this mean we should be worried about the Higgs field after all?
Expanding Sun 18.8 billion years In 5 billion years the Sun will consume all of its hydrogen fuel and expand to become a red giant. In the process it will consume Mercury, Venus and Earth.
Star formation ends 100 trillion years All star formation ends about 100 trillion years after the Big Bang, and galaxies start to die out.
©
SA NA
Above: NASA’s WMAP spacecraft has used sensitive detectors in order to accurately measure the universe’s age Alexander Bednyakov of the Joint Institute of Nuclear Research, Russia, along with other scientists, carried out a detailed analysis in late 2015 using LHC data. They accounted for strong force interactions and other quantum corrections, revealing a painstaking body of work. They concluded that, as close as possible to the best theoretical fit, the universe is indeed in a metastable state. However, the values of the parameters they used are far closer to a region of absolute stability than what other previous studies suggested. It’s important to remember that there are a few scenarios for the universe’s eventual end: the Big Rip, the Big Freeze, the Big Crunch and the heat death of the universe. The Higgs is just another theoretical scenario – and one that many physicists say is highly unlikely to ever happen. happen
Higgs causes catastrophe 100 trillion or more years The Higgs field causes a ‘catastrophic vacuum decay’, because the whole universe is inside a ‘false vacuum’ rather than the true one.
37
© NASA/JPL-Caltech
Perseverance
38
Perseverance
PREPARE FOR PERSEVERANCE THE NEXT MARTIAN ROVER Launching on 17 July, NASA’s new craft will hunt for signs of past microbial life, cache rock and dig for soil samples – all while preparing for human exploration of the Red Planet Reported by Lee Cavendish
39
© NASA/JPL-Caltech
Perseverance
M
primary mission duration of one Mars year – 687
40
days in Earth time. During this time Perseverance will inspect the Martian surface for signs of ancient life, characterise its geology and climate, prepare for future human exploration and collect samples of extraterrestrial rock for a future return mission. “Perseverance is the most sophisticated and complex rover mission we’ve ever sent to Mars. Perseverance has a new and updated science payload that makes it better suited for searching for ancient signs of life in the rock record of Mars than any previous Mars mission,” explains one of the Mars 2020 deputy project scientists,
Dr Kathryn Stack Morgan. “Previous rovers have scratched, brushed and drilled Mars rocks before, but Perseverance is the first rover that will collect and cache intact rock samples. Perseverance’s sample caching system and sample tubes were designed to ensure the scientific integrity of these samples for a potential future return to Earth, and the mission has met unprecedented requirements for biological cleanliness and contamination control to accomplish this.” “One of Mars 2020’s key objectives is to collect and cache a set of samples that could be returned
Above: NASA’s Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter has been watching over Jezero crater ahead of the rover’s arrival Right: The SuperCam will scrutinise the Red Planet’s geology with unprecedented precision
© NASA
eet the new Martian rover from NASA, Perseverance. This next-generation explorer was built upon the successes of its predecessors Spirit, Opportunity and the Mars Science Laboratory (MSL), also known as Curiosity. All of these robot explorers have worked towards helping us better understand the planet next door, Mars, and in the wider scope of science understanding the past biology and geology of other worlds. Now the Mars 2020 mission’s Perseverance rover is looking to go even further. The launch date for this mission is scheduled for 17 July 2020, but the launch window will remain open until 5 August in case of setbacks. It will fly on top of an Atlas V 541 rocket, which also launched Curiosity and InSight, from Cape Canaveral Air Force Station in Florida. However, it won’t be travelling alone. Alongside Perseverance will be a first-of-its-kind demonstration aircraft called the Mars Helicopter – more affectionately nicknamed Ingenuity. After launching the duo will spend over half a year voyaging through space to their destination, where the pair will hopefully land safely in Jezero crater on 18 February 2021. This is located on the western edge of Isidis Planitia, just north of the Martian equator. After the much-fretted ‘seven minutes of terror’, where mission staff hold their breath for seven minutes as the rover goes through atmospheric entry, descent and landing, the rover will begin its
Perseverance to Earth by a set of future missions. This concept is called Mars Sample Return, and it has been a
The most obvious and recent example of this is Curiosity, and the two rovers share an almost-
a different tread style, and it’s one of the most obvious visual differences between the two. The
goal in the planetary science community for a
identical appearance. NASA has a habit of recycling
Perseverance turret at the end of the rover’s arm is
very long time,” explains Mars 2020’s other deputy project scientist, Dr Ken Williford. “There are many
space probe designs – for example, the currently operational InSight lander uses a design taken from
also larger and heavier than Curiosity’s turret.” It’s possible for more invested admirers to
scientific and technical reasons to return samples from Mars, but one of the most exciting is the
the 2007 Phoenix lander. As the age-old saying goes: if it isn’t broken, don’t fix it.
spot the differences, but to the untrained eye the updates are hard to take notice of. Morgan explains
opportunity to use our most powerful laboratories
When asked what the visual differences are
the advantages of using an essentially identical
on Earth to look for evidence of past life.” This innovation would not have been possible
between Perseverance and Curiosity, Morgan replies: “Perseverance has redesigned thicker
layout: “The use of build-to-print designs from the Curiosity rover and its landing system allowed Mars
without the help of the missions that came before.
and sturdier wheels compared to Curiosity, with
2020 to focus its resources on the mission’s new elements and new technology. “Perseverance has a new and updated science payload compared to Curiosity. The Mastcam-Z
“Perseverance IS better suited for searching for ancient signs of life than any previous Mars mission” Kathryn Stack Morgan
and SuperCam instruments build on heritage from Curiosity’s Mastcam and ChemCam instruments, but other Perseverance instruments – like PIXL and the SHERLOC spectrometer – are entirely new.
Ingenuity: meet the Mars Helicopter The success of this prototype could transform planetary exploration forever 1.8 kilograms (four pounds)
Rotor blade span
Length of mission
Propulsion method
Key objective
Onboard equipment
Landing site
Approximately 1.2 metres (four feet)
One or more flights within 30 days
Counterrotating blades that spin at about 2,400 revolutions per minute (rpm)
The first-ever technology demonstration of powered flight on Mars
Navigation sensors, computers and two cameras: one colour and one black and white
Jezero crater – the helicopter will be in the belly of the Perseverance rover
Height Approximately 0.5 metres (19 inches)
Power system Purely solarpowered
© NASA/JPL-Caltech
Mass
41
Perseverance
Perseverance’s instrumental suite
4
This investigative arsenal will reveal remarkable things about ancient Martian life and habitability
1
1 Mastcam-Z Its objective is to take highdefinition videos, panoramic colour and 3D images of Mars, with the added ability to zoom in on distant objects.
5 6
2 2 Radar Imager for Mars’ subsurface experiment (RIMFAX)
3
Designed to see beneath the surface, RIMFAX will use ground-penetrating radar to detect underground geological features.
3 Mars Oxygen In-Situ Resource Utilization Experiment (MOXIE) x3 images © NASA/JPL-Caltech
This experiment will test if we can produce oxygen from Mars’ carbon dioxide-rich atmosphere. This will have implications for the production of breathable oxygen and rocket propellant on other worlds.
Curiosity measures chemistry, mineralogy and the organic content of rock samples in a ‘bulk’ way from powdered drill fines. In contrast, Perseverance’s PIXL and SHERLOC instruments allow us to produce detailed maps of chemistry, mineralogy, organics and texture without grinding up the rocks.” Seven new scientific instruments – including the aforementioned Planetary Instrument for X-ray Lithochemistry (PIXL), Scanning Habitable Environments with Raman and Luminescence for
history of water and habitability, search for signs of past life and snap some more of those Mars selfies that everybody loves so much. One experiment that will contribute to the Mars 2020 project, but will separate from the rover on arrival, is the Mars Helicopter. In April 2020 it was named ‘Ingenuity’ by a student from Tuscaloosa County High School in Northport, Alabama. It’s purely a demonstration experiment. It is intended to become the first aircraft to execute powered
on Mars, where the gravity is roughly a third of the strength of Earth’s. The atmospheric density at Mars’ surface level is just one per cent of Earth’s at sea level, so there have always been questions about how these alien conditions on Mars will alter aircraft flight performance. “Rather than supporting Perseverance’s science mission, the helicopter is meant to pave the way for future Mars exploration. Perseverance’s cameras will be important to select a safe launch and landing
Organics and Chemicals (SHERLOC) spectrometer, SuperCam and Mastcam-Z – will explore the geology of the Jezero crater landing site, assess its
flight on another planet, and if it works it will be a truly remarkable feat of engineering. Ingenuity will inform future innovative missions about flight
area for the helicopter,” says Williford. “If all goes well, we should be able to capture an exciting image of the helicopter in flight!”
42
Perseverance 4 SuperCam SuperCam will search for signs of ancient life by analysing the chemical composition of rocks and soil, even to the degree it can identify their atomic and molecular make-up.
Below: Perseverance’s MOXIE and MEDA instruments will return valuable data for the future human exploration of Mars
With this outstanding arsenal of investigative apparatus the Mars 2020 mission will be well equipped to reveal the secrets of Jezero crater. But why this Martian site in particular? “Jezero crater was chosen as the landing site for the Perseverance rover because it contains evidence of an ancient lake and delta that we believe was once habitable,” says Morgan. “Delta and lake sediments on Earth are known to be great preservers of organic matter and evidence of life,
5 Mars Environmental Dynamics Analyzer (MEDA)
and we hope that signs of ancient Martian life may be preserved in the rocks exposed in Jezero crater.” When looking back at the Mars Exploration Rovers, Spirit and Opportunity, and reminiscing
The local weather will be analysed with MEDA, including wind speed and direction, humidity, temperature and the dust in the atmosphere.
about their journeys through Gusev crater and Meridiani Planum respectively, they both followed the water. Their main objective was to determine whether Mars was once a wet planet or not. Together they contributed pivotal evidence to the
6 Planetary Instrument for X-ray Lithochemistry (PIXL) PIXL includes an X-ray spectrometer that will identify the chemical elements residing in rocks in incredibly precise detail.
7 Scanning Habitable Environments with Raman and Luminescence for Organics and Chemicals (SHERLOC) Consisting of spectrometers, a laser and a camera, SHERLOC will search for minerals, organic molecules and potential biosignatures in Jezero crater.
popular hypothesis that Mars had oceans, lakes and a warmer atmosphere over 3 billion years ago. A host of rovers and orbiters were fundamental in coming to this conclusion. The European Space Agency’s Mars Express orbiter and NASA’s Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter have even suggested water ice still exists at the planet’s poles. Now the Mars 2020 Perseverance rover is able to build upon this amazing legacy of discovery and focus on whether there was ever ancient life on Mars. It is generally agreed that a warm and wet planet is ideal for life as we know it to arise – which
“Rather than supporting Perseverance, the helicopter is meant to pave the way for future Mars exploration” Ken Williford
© NASA
7
43
Perseverance Mars once was. With Jezero crater, as a former lake and delta, being an excellent candidate to scrutinise, scientists may finally be able to answer the allimportant question of whether there has ever been
have an instrument called MOXIE that takes in carbon dioxide from the Martian atmosphere and converts it to oxygen.” As seen with previous NASA missions, the
5
engineering facts as told by the team
life elsewhere in the Solar System. “If we see chemical elements, minerals and
public have once again been able to register to become a part of this endeavour. Similar to the
organic molecules that tend to be associated with life, and especially if we see these things arranged
space agency’s past InSight and Parker Solar Probe mission launches, NASA created the ‘Send Your
in spatial patterns that suggest biology, this could be evidence of ancient life on Mars,” says Williford.
Name To Mars’ campaign, which has resulted in 10,932,295 people having their names stencilled
It could be the case that in the near future humans will be walking around on Mars. NASA and
onto three fingernail-sized silicon chips by electron beams. These three chips were attached to an
other global space agencies and private companies
anodised plate which also had a laser-etched
are currently looking to visit, inhabit and colonise the Red Planet. Although this will all happen in
graphic depicting Earth and Mars on either side of the Sun as it shines on both planets – akin to
small stages over the next few decades, it is NASA’s current intention to go back to the Moon by 2024
some depictions of the Golden Records sent aboard NASA’s Voyager space probes. This remarkable rover
and then onward to Mars. Perseverance will assist in this dream of interplanetary exploration.
bears the expectations of over 10 million people on its robotic shoulders, but if its predecessors are
“One of the biggest surprises early in Curiosity’s mission was how much damage the rover’s wheels accumulated from driving over the sharp, rocky terrain. To avoid any such problems, Perseverance has completely redesigned wheels that are thicker, stronger and better at climbing slopes.”
As Williford explains, Mars 2020 “has a weather station called MEDA that is contributed by Spain
anything to go by, this mission will reap some groundbreaking results for many Earth years to
Martian rock sample collection
and will improve our understanding of surface conditions that astronauts would experience. We
come and will pioneer future missions to even greater heights.
“One of Mars 2020’s key objectives is to collect and cache a set of samples that could be returned to Earth” Ken Williford
This rover is different from the rest, and these are the five main reasons why
New wheels Dr Kathryn Stack Morgan
Dr Ken Williford “Mars 2020 will collect about 30 rock cores and soil samples, seal them in ultra-clean titanium tubes and deposit them in one or more collections on the surface. The future mission concept currently being studied jointly by NASA and the ESA would have two follow-on missions – one orbiter and one lander – launching as early as 2026.”
Onboard microphones Dr Kathryn Stack Morgan
Below: Plans to collect a Martian rock sample will eventually lead to a mission that will send it back to Earth
“Another advance on Perseverance is the presence of several microphones. These microphones will allow us to hear the sounds of Perseverance’s descent through the Martian atmosphere, what a working rover sounds like on Mars and even the sound of the rocks and soils when we analyse them with our SuperCam laser.”
Producing oxygen Dr Ken Williford “We have an instrument called MOXIE that takes in carbon dioxide from the Martian atmosphere and converts it to oxygen. This is a small-scale demonstration of a technology that could one day be scaled up to provide oxygen for astronauts to breathe or as rocket propellant to help return them to Earth.”
New landing sensor “Although many aspects of the Mars 2020 landing system are heritage from the MSL mission, we will use a new capability called Terrain Relative Navigation (TRN) along with the rover’s enhanced computer processor to avoid terrain hazards as we’re approaching our landing site in Jezero crater. Previous missions deemed Jezero crater too unsafe to land, so it’s thanks to TRN that we’re heading to Jezero.”
44
© NASA/JPL-Caltech
Dr Kathryn Stack Morgan
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Interview Peter Beck
INTERVIEW BIO Peter Beck
Peter Beck founded Rocket Lab in 2006 and still operates as CEO. He grew up in the city of Invercargill, New Zealand, developing a passion for rocketry. This passion led to the creation of his company and its influential Electron rocket, with Peter at the helm as the company’s head visionary and chief engineer. He has been given many awards back in his home country of New Zealand, receiving the Cooper Medal, presented by New Zealand’s Royal Society, New Zealander of the Year and New Zealand EY Entrepreneur of the Year. He has also received the Meritorious Medal from the Royal Aeronautical Society.
Peter Beck
THE MAN BEHIND ROCKET LAB All About Space speaks to the CEO and founder of Rocket Lab about the company’s successes in 2019, what the future holds in its collaboration with NASA and how SpaceX’s Starlink could impact astronomy Interviewed by Lee Cavendish Rocket Lab had a very successful 2019, with six successful launches, and you managed to build your American base. How do you look back on
dark, but instead of just hitting a dead end, there’s a guy there standing with a shotgun.
that year personally? 2019 was a solid year. 2020, at least pre-COVID, was going to be a much bigger year. I’m super proud of the team last year. Like you say, we got six vehicles away, which put us in place for being the fourth most launched rocket in the world [that year]. This year we were planning to double that, and we’ll see if we can still hold to that plan. We’ve got the first flight of our Photon satellite platform. We acquired a satellite company with similar components and we’ve moved much further down the road for recovery as well. So 2020, even though it’s early days, is shaping up to be a really big year, but I’m super proud of the team for 2019.
You’ve got to run through this maze and make all the right decisions. But you also have to be cautious enough to just poke your head around the corner, and if you see the guy standing there with a shotgun, you have to have the courage to stop what you’re doing and change direction, but not always stopping and changing your direction too early, otherwise you never get through the maze.
To come along so quickly in just a year is a massive achievement. What do you put that down to? Relentless execution by a very dedicated team. That’s all it comes down to. I think Rocket Lab’s approach is really good. We try to strike the balance between spending time in analysis and spending time on testing. It is striking that balance – if you spend too much time on one side, like analysis, it will take years and years and years to build anything. If you spend too much on the other side, in testing, and you just keep blowing stuff up, you don’t move forward. It’s finding that middle ground where there’s an optimum point and you get the maximum development. Since Rocket Lab’s inception, can you pinpoint a make-or-break moment for the company? Or, being in the business of rocketry, is every launch a make-or-break moment? The way I often describe it to people is: building a rocket company is like running in a maze in the
Before COVID-19 hit, Rocket Lab had some success testing how to catch a rocket stage in midair using helicopters. Can you tell us more about that? The plan here for the reuse and recovery of stage one [of the Electron rocket] is a little bit different to the proven techniques. With a small launch vehicle you don’t have the propellant reserves to do
propulsive landings. If you did you turn a small launch vehicle into a large launch vehicle and that defeats the purpose. The plan for us here is as we descend through the atmosphere, the stage is guided through a very, very narrow corridor – and we’ve proven we can do that now twice in a row and keep the stage healthy and in one piece – then we deploy some decelerators, some parachutes, and get it ‘under chute’. Then once it’s ‘under chute’ we want to snag it before it lands in the ocean, because that is not good for a rocket, that’s for sure. Especially one like ours, which is heavily software and electronics based. There are three big pillars that we need to do [to capture and reuse a rocket]. The first one is reentering, which we’ve proven. The second one is parachuting; Flight 17 has a block upgrade which we will try to put parachutes on. And then the third thing that we need to try and prove is can
Above: Beck hopes Rocket Lab can collect its main stages by intercepting and catching them with a helicopter in the near future Right: Rocket Lab’s first commercial satellite launch occurred on 19 April 2018
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Interview Peter Beck we snatch something out of the sky as it is falling, which was the test we did recently.
staff and hundreds of names come up, so we’ve got
Rocket Lab certainly has interesting names for its missions, such as ‘That’s a Funny Looking
You’ve spoken briefly about the Photon rocket
Cactus’ and ‘Make it Rain’. Who is coming up with these names? Some are me, but it’s also the staff. It’s such a serious, high-stress business, it’s nice to have something that’s just a little bit comical. The first
mechanics, electrons emit photons, and they’re smaller than an electron. It’s a satellite, and one of
rocket was called ‘It’s a Test’, and we had to submit a name to Space Command, and this name was
the things that previously frustrated me is that as
so many things you can’t test until you fly. I went to the team and said: “When there’s something
Why not just cut out the middleman and provide a satellite all ready for our customers to just integrate
bleeping on someone’s radar screen, and it’s not going in the right direction, it’ll be far more useful for us to just call it what it is, which is ‘it’s a test’.”
a solved problem. But we look at satellites and we think there’s a lot of work to go there. Throughout
Instead of ‘RC-11301’ or something like that, it was just ‘It’s a Test’. When we flew the next one, it
my career I’ve seen so many start-up companies
doing, and after the first one we all had a laugh, so from then onwards we kept the naming regime. Every time we get a new mission, we canvas the
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I’m carrying someone’s satellite to orbit, beneath it I have everything that constitutes a satellite also.
their sensors on? We look at the launch and we see launches as
was ‘Still Testing’. It wasn’t intended to be funny at the start. It was intended to explain what we were
Below: Rocket Lab launched an impressive six rockets in 2019 and strives to continue this success
line you have coming up. Can you please expand on that? Photon is a satellite platform, and the reason why we call it ‘Photon’ is that under quantum
going to be on the screen as it flew. As with any first vehicle, you have to be realistic in that there are
Right: Rocket Lab’s Photon satellite bus aims to assist governments and companies in launching sensors and equipment
a good repertoire now of names for launches.
go and raise a bunch of money, build a team, they go and build their first satellite and they put it on orbit and it fails. It doesn’t fail because their sensor doesn’t work. It fails because of something stupid like a reaction wheel, a star tracker or something to do with the base infrastructure of the satellite.
Peter Beck What we’re trying to do is provide a base platform where satellite companies and governments only need to worry about the thing that generates some revenue, or generates some capability, and that is the sensor. Soon there will be a NASA mission being launched via Rocket Lab as well. Could you tell us a bit about that? This mission is one that we have sort of flown
Right: Beck is particularly excited about the launch of NASA’s CAPSTONE mission, which contributes to the dawn of a lunar gateway
once already for NASA, whereas the next launch vehicle that’s currently sitting on the pad has a NASA payload as well. But the CAPSTONE [Cislunar Autonomous Positioning System Technology Operations and Navigation Experiment] mission is just an awesome mission. That mission really leverages our Photon satellite platform to the maximum. It is the most potent version of it possible. What that enables us to do is get 35 kilograms (77 pounds) to the Moon. The CAPSTONE mission is the first spacecraft to go into the [lunar] gateway to start building infrastructure so that the gateway will allow humans to return to the Moon. It’s an incredibly wonderful mission and an honour to be involved in it. But what it does do now is, with the creation of Photon, we can provide satellites for our customers all the way up to the Moon or even interplanetary. We can get 25 kilograms (55 pounds) to Venus and the same to Mars. We’ve built a real capability there now. I guess the most exciting thing for me about that whole capability is not just the engineering feat – which it really is with the trajectory in the GNC [Guidance, Navigation and Control] trickery – it’s the fact that you can now go to the Moon, or to Mars or Venus, for under $20 million [£16.2 million]. Historically you wouldn’t even get a study for that, and now you can actually do it. I’m super excited about what that means for planetary science, and what missions we can do now for such ridiculously low prices. Are space and planetary science aspects that you’re interested in, or is it mainly rocketry? Rocket Lab is definitely a space company now, so we’re known for our Electron launch vehicle. But we also have our Photon satellite line. We’ve also purchased a company that produces satellite components. We actually manage satellites for governments, so we’re very much a space company across all of those centres. But I guess for me personally, I have a deep passion for Venus. I think Venus is a very, very underrated planet. Mars – everyone’s excited about Mars. I couldn’t care less about Mars at all. I’m very excited about Venus. I’m excited about Venus because Venus is like Earth if climate change goes wrong. And I think there’s a lot to be learned from Venus. Also, the closest probable candidate to prove life exists
“I’m excited about Venus because its like Earth if climate change goes wrong. And I think there’s a lot to be learned” outside of Earth is still Venus. I think within Venus’ atmosphere there’s an area – a regime – in the air which is moderate. But you know, the jury’s still out on whether or not there could be bacteria living in Venus’ atmosphere. That’s what gets me excited about Venus. Nobody will even step foot on Venus. That’s one thing that Mars has got going for it. But as a planet, and as something to learn from, I think [Venus has got] a lot more going for it. As someone who launches satellites, you must think it’s almost criminal how only a few satellites have actually been launched to survey Venus, especially compared to Mars? Yeah. Absolutely. I mean, the longest a spacecraft has survived on Venus is 52 minutes. It’s 90 atmospheres on the surface and hot enough to melt lead, so it’s incredibly difficult to get to the surface. Mars is a piece of cake. There’s just a thick enough atmosphere and you can get to the ground and it’s fine. Venus, however, is a very challenging environment for exploration. SpaceX has recently come under some criticism from the astronomy community due to its Starlink satellite constellations. What are your thoughts on how your business might similarly affect night-sky observers and on SpaceX’s Starlink situation? I’ve been hammered on this one. If you go back to January 2018 I launched the Humanity Star, which was a twinkling ‘star’ in the sky. The purpose of that was for everybody to look up and appreciate the planet that they’re on and the vastness of the
universe. It lived for three months. I put it in an orbit that was decaying very quickly. That was a very painful time. A lot of people really didn’t like that. A lot of people really did. In fact, probably more people liked it than didn’t like it. But the people who didn’t like it got a very strong, solid platform. It obviously taught me a lot, but I think it raised awareness, which was great. However, if you’re going to try and put up [over] 30,000 satellites, that becomes a real problem. And I know that there’s a lot of talks right now about what it means for Earth observation of our universe, but we have to deal with this as well as a launch vehicle provider. When the Starlink satellites were first launched, they were in the ‘string of pearls’. And we’ve had two launches now where we’ve tried to launch and those ‘string of pearls’ have coincided with our launch. We end up with a bunch of one-minute launch windows because we have to shoot the rocket in between satellites as they go over, so if you’ve got 30,000, that becomes infinitely more difficult to launch. And it’s not just Starlink – there’s a number of these constellations being planned. There’s the Amazon constellation and a number of others too. There needs to be more global management of how we’re going to deal with these large numbers of spacecraft in orbit, because at the moment there is no real framework in place. [At the moment, for example,] somebody in Europe sends somebody in the US an email saying: “Hey, you need to move your satellite because it’s getting a bit close,” and that logs into a terminal and moves the satellite. This needs to be autonomous.
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