Astronomy’s Problem with Starlink (w/ Vivienne Baldassare) and Why Toilet Paper Is White
Curiosity Weekly
Warner Bros. Discovery
4.6 • 935 Ratings
🗓️ 6 March 2020
⏱️ 13 minutes
🧾️ Download transcript
Summary
Learn about Starlink’s unintended consequences for astronomy from astrophysicist Vivienne Baldassare, NASA Einstein Postdoctoral Fellow at Yale University. Then, learn why toilet paper is white.
If you think the night sky should be included in assessments of the environmental impact of government projects, you can get involved in the Council on Environmental Quality’s Proposal to Update its NEPA Implementing Regulations. Comments should be submitted on or before March 10, 2020.
Read the document and submit comments here: https://www.regulations.gov/document?D=CEQ-2019-0003-0001
Tips on how to submit effective comments: https://www.regulations.gov/docs/Tips_For_Submitting_Effective_Comments.pdf
More information:
- CEQ’s Proposal to Update its NEPA Implementing Regulations | Council on Environmental Quality NEPA Modernization https://www.whitehouse.gov/ceq/nepa-modernization/
- NASA: In 2018, there were ~20,000 objects in orbit, ~4,500 of which are spacecraft https://orbitaldebris.jsc.nasa.gov/quarterly-news/pdfs/odqnv22i1.pdf
- Website of Vivienne Baldassare, NASA Einstein Postdoctoral Fellow at Yale University: http://viviennebaldassare.com/
- Vivienne Baldassare | Department of Astronomy. (2017). Yale.edu. https://astronomy.yale.edu/people/vivienne-baldassare
- Follow @vbaldassare on Twitter https://twitter.com/vbaldassare
Why toilet paper is white by Ashley Hamer (Listener question from Gerald)
- Technologies for reducing dioxin in the manufacture of bleached wood pulp. (1989). Google Books. https://books.google.com/books/about/Technologies_for_reducing_dioxin_in_the.html?id=iBhRA3mNiJEC
- Tissue. (2020). American Forest & Paper Association | afandpa.org. https://www.afandpa.org/our-products/tissue
- Chemical composition of wood (Date unknown). Mendel University in Brno | Mendelu.cz. https://is.mendelu.cz/eknihovna/opory/zobraz_cast.pl?cast=19242
- The Nature of Lignin. (1991, November). Conservation-us.org. https://cool.conservation-us.org/byorg/abbey/ap/ap04/ap04-4/ap04-402.html
- Understanding the effect of machine technology and cellulosic fibers on tissue properties – A Review :: BioResources. (2018). @bioresjournal. https://bioresources.cnr.ncsu.edu/resources/understanding-the-effect-of-machine-technology-and-cellulosic-fibers-on-tissue-properties-a-review/
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Find episode transcript here: https://curiosity-daily-4e53644e.simplecast.com/episodes/astronomys-problem-with-starlink-w-vivienne-baldassare-and-why-toilet-paper-is-white
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Transcript
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| 0:00.0 | Hi, you're about to get smarter in just a few minutes with Curiosity Daily from Curiosity.com. |
| 0:06.0 | I'm Cody Goff. And I'm Ashley Hamer. |
| 0:08.0 | Today you learn about why Starlink has caused some serious problems for astronomers and how you can help from astrophysicist |
| 0:14.9 | Vivian Baldisserie who's a NASA Einstein postdoctoral fellow at Yale University. |
| 0:20.5 | We'll also answer a listener question about why toilet paper is white. |
| 0:24.0 | Let's set us some curiosity. |
| 0:26.0 | There's an ambitious project underway to launch a network of satellites into orbit |
| 0:30.0 | to provide satellite internet access around the world, but it's having some unexpected consequences for researchers. |
| 0:37.0 | In case you haven't heard about this, the project is called Starlink, and today |
| 0:42.0 | astrophysicist Vivian Baldisserie joins us to tell you what the problem is and what you can do about it. |
| 0:48.1 | Here's our conversation. Let's do the basics. What is Starlink? |
| 0:53.0 | Sure, so it is a network of satellites that is being launched by SpaceX and the goal of Starlink is to provide global internet coverage. |
| 1:07.0 | The proposed network will be composed of something around 50,000 satellites and to date they have |
| 1:14.8 | launched a few hundred. Okay so I mean global internet sounds like a great thing |
| 1:22.0 | what's what's the problem? |
| 1:24.0 | Especially like what do astronomers have a problem with? |
| 1:27.3 | Yeah, so I agree that it does sound great, |
| 1:30.7 | but it turns out that these star length satellites are actually extraordinarily |
| 1:36.7 | visible from the ground with ground-based telescopes. |
| 1:41.6 | So there's lots of satellites already up in orbit, but the problem with |
| 1:46.9 | Starlink satellites is that they are brighter than about 99% of the things that are currently in orbit. |
| 1:54.5 | So they're super bright and super detectable |
... |
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