Science Stories

[Best of] Exoplanetary life conference by Science Stories

Center for Exolife Sciences at the Niels Bohr Institute at University of Copenhagen organised a conference under the theme "Are we a unique species on a unique planet or are we just the ordinary standard?" We may already have detected traces of life in the atmosphere of the distant planet called K2 18b. During four days in Copenhagen 100 researchers were discussing how we interpret signs of life outside our planet.

In this podcast Science Journalist Jens Degett is interviewing Professor Nikku Madhusudhan from University of Cambridge on exoplanetary atmosphere analysis. and former NASA Chief Historian and Director of the NASA History Officer Steven Dick on conspiracy aliens in the media.

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Though we may not hear so much in the media about Mars these days, there is still a lot of really interesting research on the red planet.

The two Mars rovers, Curiosity and Perseverance are more than living up to their mission expectation but there are 7 other missions making new discoveries every day and a handful of new missions are on their way.

Science Journalist Jens Degett is interviewing PhD Fellow Katrine Wulff Nicolaisen from Centre for Star and Planet Formation at the University of Copenhagen. She is working on a daily basis with the two rovers on mars and she is also working on a meteorite called Black Beauty which originates from mars.

The podcast is part of our project Danish Space Research III supported by Otto Mønsteds Foundation and Thomas B. Thriges Foundation.

During the summer particle research at CERN has been speeding up. After the Higgs particle was discovered and analyzed more particles at higher energies are needed to reach new levels of understanding of the universe. The top Quarks and the Di-Higgs particle are examples.

Science Journalist Jens Degett is interviewing Associate Professor Troels Christian Petersen from the Niels Bohr Institute in Copenhagen on how success in smashing particles at CERN can change our view of the universe.

The podcast is part of our project Danish Space Research III supported by Otto Mønsteds Foundation and Thomas B. Thriges Foundation.

It is more than a quarter Century since Denmark took its first steps into space age with the first satellite called Ørsted with the purpose of measuring the magnetic fields around the Earth.

The mission was a great success in many ways and paved the way for several research groups working with different astrophysical problems. But it was also the beginning of satellite production in Denmark and that is the theme of the podcast today.

I was there in 2000 when the first Danish satellite was launched from The Vandenberg airbase in The USA - or rather I waited at the Launch-site but due to weather and technical problems it took a long time before the satellite went up.

Today many universities and technical schools are producing satellites for different purposes. The price for launching is going down very fast. For about 2000 US$ it should be possible to buy space for a one kilo satellite to go to space. Then comes all the development and communication devices you need to control your satellite.

Chief consultant Per Lundahl Thomsen from Denmarks Technical University explain to Jens Degett what you need to make your own satellite.

DTU SPACE

Institut for Rumforskning og Rumteknologi

If you look at flight maps you can see small stipulated lines with magnetic field direction - on the map. The journalist was told that these lines were moving over time, so as a pilot he had to buy new maps once in a while.

The magnetic lines are not static they are moving. This means that the magnetic north is moving too and in fact there has been a movement of the magnetic North of more than 40 km/year, moving north from Alaska to Siberia.

In this podcast science journalist Jens Degett is asking Professor Chris Finlay questions on how the magnetic field is created on our earth. Why it may shift or reverse and what importance magnetic fields are protecting our planet from having our atmosphere blown away by the solar wind particles.

There is a lot of interesting stories on how we can use manometers in mobile phones to measure direction and finally Chris Finlay reveal how different the magnetic fields are on other planets. in our solar system and beyond.

The podcast is part of our project Danish Space Research III supported by Otto Mønsteds Foundation and Thomas B. Thriges Foundation.

3iATLAS is the third interstellar object or "Interloper" that has been observed in our solar system. The first object of this kind was Oumuamua which was discovered on its way out of our solarsystem in 2017. This time we are more lucky as the interstellar object 3iATLAS has been observed early in its path through our solar system in the beginning of july.

3iATLAS is a rare guest and will disappear out of our solar system in a few month. Until then, we may study the object via telescopes and other sensors and discover new scientific secrets about the development of our galaxy, the universe and maybe even organic material which is needed for development of life as we know it. There are even researchers who think the new interstellar object is formed by intelligent life, but there are currently no proven signs of that. Professor in astrophysics Uffe Gråe Jørgensen from the Niels Bohr Institute in Copenhagen is interviewed by Science Journalist Jens Degett.

The podcast is part of our project Danish Space Research III supported by Otto Mønsteds Foundation and Thomas B. Thriges Foundation.

Superstrings was a very popular topic among physicists in the 1980ies. They had a renaissance in 1995 but then the researchers changed focus to other things. Now superstrings have gained new momentum in physics again. Professor Niels Obers from the Niels Bohr Institute explains what superstrings and string theory is. He also explains why superstrings are popular among researchers again. Science journalists Jens Degett is interviewing.

Gravitational waves is a strange phenomena which was predicted already by Albert Einstein.

To understand gravitational waves you need to understand gravitation. In this podcast professor Niels Obers describe gravitation in Newtonian terms and in the frame of Einstein's general theory of relativity. Both descriptions are incomplete but due to research with gravitational waves we may reach to a better understanding of these phenomena.

Since 2015 where gravitational waves were first detected with certainty, a number of new gravitational wave detectors are being build and researchers are learning more about the ripples in time, space and the fabric of the universe.

Science Journalist Jens Degett from Science Stories is interviewing professor Niels Obers from the Niels Bohr Institute at University of Copenhagen.

When someone begins to study the evolution of the universe and the laws of physics, one easily comes to wonder how strange it is that humans and life exist, and we are able to observe the universe. If the laws and constants of nature were just a little bit different, the occurrence of life is unthinkable. However, we can state that we are here, and this raises a number of other issues, such as: Has the universe always been able to sustain life? Will the universe continue to sustain the existence of life in the future ? Are we just one of many universes that exist in parallel?

Science Journalist Jens Degett from Science Stories talks to Professor Niels Obers, Director of the Nordic Institute for Theoretical Physics (NORDITA) and professor at the Niels Bohr Institute in Copenhagen, to try and get to the bottom of the matter. This podcast is a continuation of their conversation in a former story "Big Bang challenged by Conformal Cyclic Cosmology".