Hello and welcome to Let's Dive In. It's our little podcast where we have a go at answering questions all about life, the universe and everything in it. I'm Phil. And I'm Julie. So let's dive in. Hello, Julie, and welcome to the last episode of Let's... Dive in. Last episode of season three. That means we've done 30 episodes, Phil. That's quite a milestone, I think. 30 is a milestone. It's been a lot of work. I feel both excited and also relieved.
because it's a huge amount of work but like I love chatting it's great and there's been so many things like I can't even believe that I could pick a favourite I actually really enjoy talking to the kids because I love hearing their answers to some of the questions that they ask themselves I think their imaginations are just wonderful. They're like a whole different universe, I think.
Yeah, they're not bound by like logic sometimes or think limits or barriers that have been put on them. So the ideas that they come up with then push those limits and those barriers. And I think it's great because we've talked about some of the things this year that have been amazing.
You know, I mean, 2022 was a good year. There's been a lot of awesome things. A lot of awesome things. And I think maybe it's worth us having a little talk about one of the coolest things that happened in science in 2022. And that's also a great segue. It's almost as if we've planned this and we've gotten good after 30 episodes. It actually relates to a question that one of our fabulous kids who visited UCD Explorer actually asked.
I'm Caelan, I'm nine years old. How do you get the biggest satellite launched into space in a rocket ship? That beautifully links to the James Webb telescope, which launched a... Christmas before Christmas in 2021 and released its very first images last summer. Those images were incredible. The dawn of a new era of astronomy. Dun, dun, dun. It does.
That's what some people call it. And we'll put a link in the show notes to some of the first images that were released from the James Webb telescope. But it's just out of this world. Literally. No. Out of this world. Very good. If only our podcast was called that. But it's not. It's called Let's Dive In. So. Let's dive in. OK, so first things first, let's take Kaylin's question to some of the other kids and see what they think. They would have a big rocket ship? You can't.
Like in lots of bits, like one go, yeah. In lots of bits, that's what I think. They launch different rockets and then...
They build it up there. Maybe they attach it onto the rocket and when it gets into space, you know how like when they get closer into space, the rocket detaches. Maybe the satellite detaches at some point. They probably... had it like a rocket they probably had it the same at turbines on the bottom shooting it up and then the turbines would fall like a rocket and it would it would be up there and then the pressure of the sys- the solar system would bring it around showing- showing the planets
So do they send it up in bits or do they just attach some boosters and launch it up into space? What is going on? Well, in fairness, if you're from Dublin... and you say something's in bits it means it's wrecked or it's in brutal state so I don't know I presume in bits means in pieces yes but to find out exactly we've asked a friend of the show a very
eminent friend of the show, retired NASA astronaut Bruce Malnick to come back and help us with this question. Like Bruce was involved in launching satellites and was even traveling around up in space in the 80s and 90s. So he should know. All right. So. Bruce, thank you very much for coming back onto the show. First, let's talk a little bit about the James Webb telescope in particular. How big is this thing? It's about the size of a tennis court. I mean, it's 22 metres by 12 metres.
in size like that's no joke that's pretty massive the size of the sun shields on the James Webb telescope when they're fully open like think of all of the space that they take up like How do we get that up into space? So first thing you do is you collapse it down. You have to make everything to where it unfolds. and you make it into just a really tight package because you're going to have to push this thing up through the atmosphere. I feel the liftoff. The clock has started.
So you make it as small as you can, and then you let it grow to be a tennis. Okay, so we've determined that it all goes up in one piece inside one rocket. Now, the image that I have in my head is that the satellite is like one of those... panels that's when it's dry it's like a tiny little hard rock and then as soon as you soak it in water it goes poof and opens up and it's really big and ready to use okay okay so first question
What's a flannel? Like a tiny towel that you wash your face with. Oh, a face cloth. Sorry. Yes, I do know what that is because I also wash. Yes, I like that analogy. Very good. Two questions, even reasons why that mightn't work. One. Satellites aren't made of face cloths and panels. And two, there's no water up in space, Julie. True. Okay. What about thinking of it more like an umbrella?
That's a good mechanical uh similarity if you take an umbrella and you know it's nice and long when it's compact and you could put that in a rocket shoot it up in the rocket then you get up in space and out comes the solar panels and it's just like that That's the actual noise that it makes. Definitely. 100%. If not, they should add that sound effect.
So we did a bit of homework and we looked into this. And what they really did with the telescope is they used techniques inspired by an art form that has been around for centuries. Can you guess what it is? ancient art probably not uh they didn't paint it into the middle of the rockets did they just like slap it on there nope nope try again um
Oh, actually, no, I do have an idea. Was it that folding thing with the... Oh, I do know this. Origami. Yes. Ancient art of origami. Yes, that's it. That's it. That's it. They used origami and my kids love... origami. It's amazing that something so ancient can still be used today up in space with some of the coolest technology that we have.
You see, you've got this massive sun shield and these huge mirrors of the James Webb telescope and they get folded up like bits of paper to go up into space where they then unfold. So using something similar to origami, the scientists were able to use some clever engineering to fold these 18 hexagonal pieces of the mirror. And then five layers of super thin sunshield material, 12 times in order to pack it snugly into the rocket. So...
I'm kind of thinking of like an accordion, an umbrella and origami all rolled up into, or should I say folded up into one. It all gets sent up into space in a nice, neat little package. And what's even cooler is you can make your very own origami satellites and space shuttles too. There's a great video showing you how the James Webb telescope was folded up like origami paper to fit into the rocket that went... up into space and we'll put a link in the show notes so you can have a look.
We also had another question from the kids about space telescopes. Hi, I'm Izzy and I'm six years old. Why do we have telescopes in space when we have them on the ground? Great question. We've talked about Earth-based telescopes on the show before with space pirate Dr. Lana Salmon. Go check out that episode if you haven't already. And we also talked about space telescopes with rocket engineer David McCown too, and how these telescopes like us need...
Sun cream. Like, some of the stuff we talk about is mad. Totally mad. But the question now is, why do we have telescopes up in space in the first place? The ones on the ground, they don't need sun cream. And the ones up in space are... really really big and there's a lot of extra fuss and folding to do to get them up there. It's not easy to actually go and fix it if it's broken and let's be honest they ain't cheap.
So why do we even bother with them? Well, I think we start where we start normally. Let's see what the kids think. So we can see closer into the planet so that we can see what's inside them even though we're not on them. To see the terrain and species living on it and how water freezes in the ground. I think they're trying to look back in time because we also...
that if, say if aliens had a telescope on a planet really, really far away that could see her, they'd only see dinosaurs. So we wanted to see what dinosaurs and animals really look like, like the saber tooth. and the woolly mammoths. I think it's for, like, if you don't know if they're dangerous or not, you can just look on planets and see, like, what's on them and who's living on them. Those were all really cool answers.
but not actually the one we're looking for. No, we're not actually looking for that one. Although we do look for dinosaurs regularly, the main reason is actually... We have these space telescopes up in space to better look at stars, planets, galaxies and other cool and hot things up in space. Now, our planet, planet Earth, has this protective blanket surrounding it, which is our atmosphere.
And it lets some light through so that we can live and survive and, well, see. But it also blocks other types of light. And for the most part, this is great. We don't want to get harmed by the rays from the sun and space. We would not. be safe from x-rays and gamma rays that would bombard us if there was no atmosphere. But this safety blanket is a nuisance if we actually want to study those x-rays and gamma rays and those other types of light that come from space.
And another thing, our atmosphere has shifting pockets of air that interfere with the pictures being taken. These pockets of air are actually what cause our stars to look like they're twinkling in the night sky. nice for that but this movement of air actually blurs any pictures taken by telescopes on the ground. Now we can't just ask the atmosphere to you know shift over a bit please and could you let some light through and and then we might hope that it
reach those ground-based telescopes. So instead, we have to get around it. Or above it. So we take telescopes up into space. Telescopes like the Hubble telescope, which has been in space for over 25 years and taken a phenomenal... 1.5 million pictures which allows us even to see how planets are being born. We can witness galaxies crashing into each other and see light from the most...
distant collections of stars in the universe. Now, as this is our last episode of the season, we really wanted to get some great insight from the kids. So we asked them another question. to see anything in space, what would you look for? The terrains of the planets. I would, like, see what animals, if they, like, look the same. Do the same things. New planets in life. Aliens. Aliens and look for more planets, like better ones. Really good ones. Maybe a new type of like a banana or something.
It'd be that like that like kind of like a lot really long oval and it would be orange So yes, we do all of this stuff and this kid is looking for a banana That's like an orange. A ban-orange. Ooh, ban-orange pie. An orana. An orana. Ooh. Anyway. But I mean, it was a cool fact to finish off this episode and the season, in fact.
And given that the kids are so intent on finding planets, they might like to know that as a fact, there are thousands of planets that have been discovered out in space. That's true. Astronomers call them exoplanets. like planet Earth, some are totally strange. And some might have life on them, but their life hasn't been discovered yet. Yes, but it's thanks to space telescopes that all these planets have been discovered.
2026, a new telescope called Plato is planning to scan the universe for Earth-like planets. How cool is that? Another one up there. Super, super cool. So, one final question for the kids. If you found a planet, what do you think it would be like? If I discovered the rose planet, it would be the rose planet, but it has to be. Because I'll make it rose. Because it has loads of roses on it.
If I found a planet that was purple or green, I'd call it Planet Grape. Welcome to Planet Brain. Nice. I think, I mean, I'd live on them. I'd also travel. And it's amazing to have the kids on and keep listening to them. And also having you listen to us. And thank you for doing that. Thank you to listening for our podcast this year. And I have some good news. We have been renewed. for another season. So we'll be back again later in the year for even more. We're gonna make 40, Julie. Yes, yes.
Maybe that six seasons in a movie is still the dream. Ah, yes, yes. Yeah, you never know. Maybe Brad Pitt will finally return my calls and be able to find me playing it. Or maybe I'll get Matt Damon. Oh, The Rock. The Rock is physically probably most likely. There are dreams, Phil.
Maybe we could just play ourselves. You know, we could go down the like scientist movie star route. I can do my own stunts. Yeah. Oh, well, you can. And you often do. I mean, even walking over Lego. But it's brilliant. And just like origami, our plans are unfurled. Holding perfectly. There might be a lot of paperwork. No, I don't like... No, we'd leave... We'd hire someone. I don't like paperwork because...
Oh, no, wait. I see what you're doing. You're doing that thing. It's origami, so it's paperwork. I think most of our listeners are here not for the science. It's really just for the jokes. Your brilliant jokes. It's why they pay us the medium books. As opposed to the big books, yes. I suppose.
Although, maybe we can make more money. Maybe we go pay-per-view. That doesn't sound like that. I see what you did there. Oh, yeah. Pay-per-view. Pay-per-view. Because of the origami. Origami. Yeah, because it's paper. Yeah, I know. Look. Hey, join us next season. for more awful jokes and science to dive into oh yeah I forgot about science yes bye bye for those of you who are tuning in
A, thank you very much. And B, don't forget to like and subscribe. Yes, because it really does help us. So whenever you can share a link or even just tell someone about it, do share away. We have to give a big thanks out to all the kids who came into University College Dublin and asked us all the questions. Thanks to RTE and to Science Foundation Ireland for funding the show. Hashtag believe in science. Ah, hashtag yes. Yeah, we need one of those because, you know, we're cool.
Cool. We're done with the kids. Okay, well, what kind of hashtag? I presume something like hashtag let's dive in. Hashtag let's dive in it is. And we do. We dive in. We did indeed. So until next time. Until next time. See ya. Bye. Believe in science. Bye.