Barred Spiral Discoveries and Spirit's Final Mission: A Cosmic Journey Unfolds

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Warning, the following Zippercruder radio spot you are about to hear is going to be filled with F words.

When you're hiring, we at Zippercruder know you can feel frustrated.

For Lauren even, like your efforts are futile, and you can spend a fortune trying to find fabulous

people, only to get flooded with candidates who are just fine.

Fortunately, Zippercruder figured out how to fix all that.

And right now, you can try Zippercruder for free at zippercruder.com slash zip.

With Zippercruder, you can forget your frustrations, because we find the right people for your roles

fast, which is our absolute favorite F word. In fact, four out of five employers who post on Zippercruder

get a quality candidate within the first day. Fantastic! So, whether you need to hire four,

40, or 400 people, get ready to meet first rate talent. Just go to zippercruder.com slash

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This is Spacetime Series 29 episode 29, for broadcast on the 9th of March, 2026.

Coming up on Spacetime, discovery of the earliest known bad spiral galaxy,

just like our own, about 12 billion years ago. Australia's spirit satellite mission comes to an end,

and the International Space Station to remain in orbit for an additional two years.

All that and more coming up on Spacetime.

Welcome to Spacetime with Stuart Gary.

Our Milky Way Galaxy is known as a bad spiral, and debate continues on exactly how the

bar's section of stars at the heart of these types of galaxies forms and evolves.

Now, astronomers have discovered one of the earliest bad spiral galaxies ever seen.

The findings reported at the 247th meeting of the American Astronomical Society could play

an important role in science's understanding of galactic evolution. The newly discovered

galaxy, catalogued as Cosmos 747-06, is located some 11.5 billion light years away.

That's back in time, when the universe was just 2.3 billion years old.

The studies lead author Daniel Ivanov from the University of Pittsburgh says it's one of the

earliest observed spiral galaxies containing a stellar bar, a sometimes striking visual feature

that can play an important role in the evolution of a galaxy.

He says the findings help constrain the time frame in which stellar bars could have first

emerged in the universe. Now, these galactic bars aren't objects themselves,

but dense collections of stars and gas that are aligned in such a way that an image is taken

perpendicular to the galactic plane that appears to be a bright line by setting the galaxy.

Stellar bars can play a role in shaping a galaxy's evolution by funneling gas

inwards from the outer reaches of a galaxy, feeding the supermassive black hole of the galactic

center and dampening star formation throughout the stellar disk. Ivanov says he wasn't surprised

to find a bar spiral galaxy so early in the universe's evolution. He says some computer simulations

have already suggested that bars can form at Redshift 5, that's some 12.5 billion years ago.

But in principle, he thinks it's not an epoch when you'd normally expect to find many of

these objects, so it helps to be able to constrain the time scales of bar formation.

Now, other researchers have reported earlier bad spiral galaxies, but the analysis of those

are far less conclusive because the methods used to analyse the light's red shifts from those

galaxies are as definitive as the spectroscopy used to validate Cosmos 747-06. In other cases,

the galaxy's light was distorted by massive foreground galaxies acting as gravitational lenses.

Ivanov says this makes Cosmos 747-06 the highest red shift spectroscopically confirmed

unleans bad spiral galaxy ever detected. This is space time. Still to come, Australia's

spirit satellite mission comes to an end and the International Space Station to remain in orbit

for an additional two years. All that and more still to come. On space time.

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your space online with Squarespace. I've got Dan Morgan here on the pod. Say hi, Dan.

Hey, how's it going today? It's going good, man. Tell us who you are and what you do.

I'm Dan Morgan. I'm an attorney and a managing partner at Morgan Morgan, which is America's

largest injury law firm. That's pretty awesome. I think I saw billboarders recently that said

20 billion one. 20 million is insane number. Yeah, 20 billion recovered. It's actually I think

somewhere north probably closer to 22, 23 after this year. And each year we get bigger and better

and our army grows. So the number will hopefully keep getting bigger and bigger as time goes on.

Awesome. So how does someone get in contact with Morgan and Morgan? What would I do if I got into

an accident? Probably the easiest way is dialing pound law. That's pound 529 from your cell phone.

We are always open. Our call center is always waiting to take your call 24, 7365. Wow, Dan Morgan.

From Morgan and Morgan, America's largest injury law firm. Thanks for coming by the show.

Thanks for having me. Visit forthepeople.com for an office near you.

Well, after more than 25 months of successful operations in orbit, the University of Melbourne's

spirit satellite mission has come to an end. Mission managers lost contact with the space

craft in early January after the satellite began experiencing platform anomalies and communications

were intermittently lost. Now after careful assessment, the operations team have determined

that reliable contact was unlikely to be restored, formally bringing the on-albert phase of the

mission to an end. The course of the anomaly remains unknown. However, the mission did exceed its

plan to your lifespan proving the reliability of a strain designed and built spacecraft.

The space industry responsive intelligent thermal or spirit spacecraft was a technology

demonstrator testing next generation capabilities ranging from a new gamma ray space telescope

and advanced thermal cooling systems in orbit to high performance autonomous artificial intelligence

operations in actual real life space environments. Over its lifetime, the shoebox size the 11.5

kilogram nano satellite completed some 16,000 orbits of the Earth, traveling around 690

million kilometers. That's equivalent to the distance between the Earth and Jupiter.

During that time, a downlink more than 400 images and captured hundreds more for on-board edge

computing research. The mission also undertook gamma and x-ray astronomy through the homey's instrument

developed by the Italian Space Agency and International Scientific Partners. The mission's

principal investigator, Michel at Trenti from the University of Melbourne, says that in the final

months of 2025 alone, spirit recorded more than 180 hours of x-ray data using its on-board instrument

designed to detect gamma ray bursts, powerful explosions that can occur when stars die or when

neutron stars merge. Trenti says the successful deployment and operations of homies marked a

significant achievement both for the validation of the technology and for the high resolution timing

of the measurements. In the short term, mission managers will focus on analyzing and archiving

mission data for the broader scientific community with several research publications already in

preparation. Lessons learnt from spirit will inform the next generation of innovative payload

designs and it will help shape the next generation of strange space technologies from remote sensing

to edge computing in orbit. Trenti says the spacecraft is now gradually descending through the 200

kilometre altitude level. Ed Swear atmospheric drag will deal with the vehicle probably around August,

allowing it to burn up in its atmosphere. We've just concluded that they're in orbit operations

of the satellite. The satellite was originally designed to operate for 24 months. We celebrated

24 months, second birthday of operations in orbit in December, 25 and then everything was going

stronger and then in January we experienced lots of communication with the satellite and now space

space is hard. The satellite has been exposed to a very harsh environment as it orbited Earth

for over 16,000 times. So it's not surprising that you have a little bit of a turn where you

actually did much better than we were expecting. And of course things were made even worse by the

curve will met a space whether it's had to endure during its time in orbit. Indeed, indeed,

this is a really challenging time for satellites in orbit because we launched the spirit satellite in

December 2023 when the solar activity was reaching the maximum. So we have gone through quite a

bit of violent space weather storms. You have ejection of the outer layers of materials that

from the sand are called the coronal mass ejections. And so you have this charged particles that start

to travel through the solar system and then they reach Earth, they get trapped into Earth's magnetic

field which is shielding us on the surface but it also means that there are belts of charged

particles in orbit. The satellite has to go through them and they can be quite taxing on the

electronic systems on the satellite. Spirit is naturally decaying in orbit and in any case the

mission would have been over by approximately July because our orbit has decay to the point

where we will now start to quickly spiral to lower our altitudes. And in July, maybe

obviously the space weather is favorable, maybe a bit earlier if the space weather is more

temperamental. The spirit satellite will have lowered its orbit to about 200 kilometers of the

surface at which point there is enough drag and enough friction that the satellite will sit up

quickly spiral down even further and then completely burn up in the process of for a brief moment

it will be a shooting start. What was the primary aim of the spirit mission? That's a really good

question and it depends on the type of aim that we are talking about because I would say

there were two actually three primary aims. First of all, there was the aim to promote the growth

of the Australian space industry and to demonstrate that Australia was ready to design,

fabricate, test, launch and operate an internationally competitive satellite. And that I think was

with the primary aim in relation to the funding that we received from the Australian Space Agency

through promote the growth of the local space industry and the space sector. From a scientific

point of view, the primary aim was to study gamma and x-ray transients in the sky by demonstrating

the capabilities of the Hermes scientific instrument that we received thanks to international

cooperation with the Italian Space Agency. And so on spirit, we had the first flight of the Hermes

Space Telescope. We've been able to commission the instrument, measure the background, the performance,

we have done some astronomical observations and we have a scientific data that are in the process

of being analyzed and published. And there is a third aim which was to demonstrate novel technology

for future missions, in particular made in Australia technology and we have broken new ground

in thermal control system. We have flown a stirring cycle cryocooler that has a cool cap,

cool down and kept at stable temperature. The Hermes instrumented during the mission and this

is a type of cooling system which had never flown before on such a small satellite. We have also

flown a graphic card processing unit and GPU that has allowed us to run a flexible computing

environment to demonstrate artificial intelligence operations in orbit. So autonomous image processing

using some of the small cameras on spirit and in particular the ability of the system to find

human cells with very limited input from the mission control center. So very small satellite

just 11 and a bit kilos about a very packed with multiple objectives and multiple pieces of tech.

When you look at Australia Space History we were I think the fourth nation in the world

to build a satellite and then have it launched from our own soil. That was Resat which flew out

of Whomra since then there have been a few others such as FedSat but not many. Australia hasn't

really grabbed the reins in a big way has it? Yeah look I think that that's a fair comment.

If we look at the size of our domestic space sector compared to other economies around the world

or similar in size to Australia we definitely think lagging a little bit behind.

There is still I feel hope for the future because there are many research organizations that

have crossed Australia have really good ideas and they're working within the available resources

to try to have impact and they think that spirit is one example of what we can do when we get together

and multiple organizations in Australia collaborate with each other with a shared common goal of

going up and doing a peaceful space exploration. We've just had some great success with

Scramjet technology being launched on a rocket lab electron based rocket from the United States.

Rocket labs that are interesting company New Zealand based they're now I think next to SpaceX

they do the most amount of orbital launches in a year. Yeah yeah indeed and I think that that

underscores how strategic investment into a particular area of the space segment such as the one

targeted by rocket lab are very agile small rocket to deliver small payloads exactly in orbit

where you need them can be a very effective way for a smaller country or a smaller company to become

internationally competitive and be considered as you said. One of the major players

behind the few bigger ones monopolize the sector such as SpaceX at the moment for launches.

Gilmore Spacer hoping to replicate that sort of expertise here in Australia only time will tell

what happens there the sorts of lessons learned from the spirit mission is that being ploughed

back into the next satellite or is that sort of have we reached an end now of this absolutely I think

it's that's what we saw with Fed set we build a satellite it's very wonderful and then nothing

happens. Yeah yeah exactly and I think that this is this is what we we absolutely don't want to

happen. The lessons learned from spirit are already being implemented for example by the

contribution that the University of Melbourne and then through the Melbourne Space Laboratory is

delivering to the Australian lunar rover project and with the experience on our thermal control

system on spirit is being mapped into the thermal control system that we're going to use to

ensure that the Australian rover will survive transit to the moon orbiting around the moon

and then operations on the surface when it will be on the moon later this decade hopefully.

That's Professor Michel at 20 from the University of Melbourne and this space time still to come

the International Space Station to remaining orbit for additional two years and later in the science

report the world meteorological organization says neutral El Niño-Leninia conditions should

persist until at least the middle of the year or that and more still to come on space time

I've got Dan Morgan here on the pod say hi Dan hey how's it going today it's going good man

tell us who you are and what you do I'm Dan Morgan I'm an attorney and a managing partner at

Morgan and Morgan which is America's largest injury law firm that's pretty awesome um I think I

saw billboard years recently it said 20 billion one 20 billion insane number yeah 20 billion recovered

it's actually I think somewhere north probably closer to 22 23 after this year and each year

we get bigger and batter and our army grows so the number will hopefully keep getting bigger and

bigger as time goes on awesome so how does someone get in contact with Morgan and Morgan what

would I do if I got into an accident probably the easiest way is dialing pound law that's pound

five two nine from your cell phone we are always open our call centers always waiting to take your call

24 7 365 wow Dan Morgan from Morgan and Morgan America's largest injury law firm thanks for

coming by the show thanks for having me visit for the people dot com for an office near you warning

the following zippercruder radio spot you are about to hear is going to be filled with f words

when you're hiring we at zippercruder know you can feel frustrated for Lauren even like your efforts

are futile and you can spend a fortune trying to find fabulous people only to get flooded with

candidates who are just fine fortunately zippercruder figured out how to fix all that and right now

you can try zippercruder for free at zippercruder.com slash zip with zippercruder you can forget your

frustrations because we find the right people for your roles fast which is our absolute favorite f word

in fact four out of five employers who post on zippercruder get a quality candidate within the

first day fantastic so whether you need to hire four 40 or 400 people get ready to meet first

straight talent just go to zippercruder.com slash zip to try zippercruder for free don't forget

that zippercruder.com slash zip finally that zippercruder.com slash zip the international space

station is now expected to remain in orbit for an additional two years thereby extending its

operational life to 2032. The United States Senate Commerce Committee advanced a revised

NASA authorization bill s933 thereby extending the life of the international space station and

implementing some of the changes to the itemous lunar exploration program sought by NASA.

The extensions required because of ongoing delays in the commercial low with orbit space station

program which involves private companies building their own orbital space stations. The bill directs

NASA to maintain international space station operations at current levels. It instructs the agency

not to begin the transition preparing for D orbiting the station until at least one of the commercial

space station successors are operational. The first modules of the international space station were

launched way back in 1998. The 450 ton orbital outpost circles the earth at an average altitude of

about 413 kilometers traveling at an orbital speed of 27,600 kilometers an hour with each orbit

lasting approximately 92.9 minutes. The new version of the Senate Commerce Committee bill also

supports NASA administrative Jared Isaacman's decision to increase lunar launch cadence for

the itemous program to a flight every year with standardization of the SLS rocket and launchpad

facilities by not proceeding with upgrades to the space launch system and instead retaining the

existing block one version of the SLS upper stage rather than proceeding to develop a new block one

B exploration upper stage version. The bill also authorizes NASA to develop a base on the lunar

surface in line with White House directives to establish the initial elements of a permanent lunar

outpost by 2030. The plan will see the development of a permanently manned American base on the lunar

south pole capable of long duration human habitation undertaking robotic scientific technological

and strategic interests. However, the bill says very little about the Gateway Space Station,

the first modules of which are now at a construction on the ground and which will eventually be placed

in Sissel in orbit acting as a jumping off point for missions down to the lunar surface.

The biggest failure in the new bill is the formal termination of the current Mars Sample Return

Mission project. Instead, it directs NASA to submit a new plan for carrying out a revised Mars

Sample Return program within 120 days of enactment. The bill also endorses continued support for

existing NASA missions and the proposed Mars Telecommunications Orbiter project, and it

calls for new missions to send human tissues to Mars in order to study biological environmental

effects on human tissue in a Martian environment. Another mission would unlock space weather impacts

on Mars, as well as more physical and life sciences studies that could support future human

missions to the Martian surface. This is space time.

And time to take a brief look at some of the other stories making using science this week,

with the Science Report. Meteorologists say the climate is likely to see neutral

La Niña El Niño conditions until at least the middle of the year. The findings by the

World Meteorological Organization show that a weak La Niña event driving somewhat cooler and

Rainier conditions is now fading, with neutral conditions expected from now through to June.

After that, scientists say the chances of a hotter dry El Niño event rises to about 40% by July.

Although they admit it's difficult to predict months in advance.

While there's a lot of genetic evidence to show that modern humans and the

Andotholes commonly interpret across Europe, your research shows that most of that

copulation involves the Andothole males inseminating modern human females.

A report in the journal Science, based on genetic evidence from three Andothole specimens,

has found that the X chromosome from the subjects had on average 62% more human DNA than

non-sex chromosomes. The authors say the bias could have been down to made availability or cultural

sanctions for certain combinations. Archaeologists examining the chart remains of food preserved

inside ancient pottery, a shown that averse range of meals eaten by people across Europe

thousands of years ago. The findings reported in the journal PLAST-1 identified both plant and

meat remains in 58 pieces of pottery from 13 agricultural sites across northern and eastern Europe

dating back to between the 6th and 3rd millennium BCE. They found samples of a wide variety of grasses,

berries, leaves and seeds, with plants often found alongside meat in the same pot.

They say the mixtures of food found varied from region to region, likely due to the kinds of foods

available in each area. A retired American chiropractor now living on Australia has come out with

the outrageous claim that smoking can cure cancer. Now, before we go any further, let's take

categorically that there have been thousands of scientific studies undertaken clearly showing

beyond any reasonable doubt that smoking be it vape, cigarettes, cigars, whatever causes cancer.

The skeptics Tim Mendem says this latest falsehood quickly circulated around the world,

despite repeated catter arguments put forward by the Cancer Council.

On chick maulpox, chick maulpox, herpes, Parkinson's, multiple sclerosis, all cancers and tumors.

So it's a pretty all-round cure for a whole lot of diseases.

This is a lot about the quality of chiropractice, doesn't it?

It does. It's a quality in quotes. There's a lot of chiropractice who are dealing with some

areas which are really outside the areas that expertise. In a chiropractic can cure

act, bed wetting, asthma, all sorts of different things that you seem to have no relation to

the spine, apart from the fact that this notion of subluxation is a thing based on your spine,

which affects every nerve in your body, but yeah. Now, there's a lot of nonsense around

the chiropractice. Some chiropractice, most chiropractice, are putting forward.

But this guy is not running on his chiropractic expertise, he's running on a lecture called

what expertise he has actually in treating cancer. I mean, he's almost outharking back to

premedical days. People were leaching people, bleeding people with those 7 cents,

examples in two to the times of ingesting buttock spiders to cure headaches,

this interesting idea. Yes, but there's no evidence that tobacco cures cancer. There's a lot of

evidence to make up ads to cancer, including one fact check I saw was that tobacco contains

over 70 carcinogens and is linked with at least 16 types of cancer. Also, tobacco causes cancer.

That's right. tobacco causes cancer and it doesn't cure cancer. And you wonder why is he saying this?

Is it just for no variety? Is he in the pay of big tobacco? Who knows? It's a silly thing to say,

it's a dangerous thing to say, and he has been put down very quickly. That's the skeptics

to mend him and this space time.

And that's the show for now. Space time is available every Monday, Wednesday and Friday through

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You've been listening to space time with Stuart Gary. This has been another quality podcast

production from Bites.com. Finding great candidates to hire can be like, well, trying to find a

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slash zip. Warning, the following Zippercrooter radio spot you are about to hear is going to be

filled with F words. When you're hiring, we at Zippercrooter know you can feel frustrated.

For Lauren, even, like your efforts are futile and you can spend a fortune trying to find fabulous

people only to get flooded with candidates who are just fine. Fortunately, Zippercrooter figured out

how to fix all that. And right now, you can try Zippercrooter for free at zippercrooter.com slash zip.

With Zippercrooter, you can forget your frustrations because we find the right people for your roles

fast, which is our absolute favorite effort. In fact, four out of five employers who post on Zippercrooter

get a quality candidate within the first day. Fantastic. So whether you need to hire four,

40 or 400 people, get ready to meet first rate talent. Just go to zippercrooter.com slash zip to

try Zippercrooter for free. Don't forget that zippercrooter.com slash zip. Finally, that zippercrooter.com slash

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