The story of 'Oumuamua, the first visitor from another star system | Karen J. Meech

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4.1 • 11.9K Ratings

🗓️ 26 December 2018

⏱️ 14 minutes

🔗️ Recording | iTunes | RSS

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Summary

In October 2017, astrobiologist Karen J. Meech got the call every astronomer waits for: NASA had spotted the very first visitor from another star system. The interstellar comet -- a half-mile-long object eventually named `Oumuamua, from the Hawaiian for "scout" or "messenger" -- raised intriguing questions: Was it a chunk of rocky debris from a new star system, shredded material from a supernova explosion, evidence of alien technology or something else altogether? In this riveting talk, Meech tells the story of how her team raced against the clock to find answers about this unexpected gift from afar.

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Transcript

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0:00.0	You're listening to a special archive presentation of TED Talks Daily.
0:05.4	This TED Talk features astronomer and astrobiologist Karen Meach, recorded live at TED-2018.
0:14.7	NASA is always on the lookout for possible asteroid collision hazards.
0:20.6	So the PanStar's telescope is scanning the sky every night.
0:24.6	Each morning, candidate objects are examined by PanStar staff
0:29.6	and usually discovered to be no big deal.
0:32.6	But on October 19, 2017,
0:35.6	PanStar spotted an object moving rapidly between the stars.
0:40.3	And this time, the usual follow-up measurements of position and speed showed something
0:45.3	completely different. By October 22nd, we had enough data to realize that this object wasn't
0:52.3	from our solar system. Holy cow! that's when I got the phone call,
0:57.2	the phone call that all solar system astronomers are waiting for. Let me tell you how exciting this was.
1:04.3	NASA's been expecting to see an interstellar comet passed through the solar system since the 1970s,
1:10.5	but until now, we'd never seen
1:12.5	anything. Our own solar system is huge, so even getting a package from the nearest star system
1:19.6	4.4 light years away would take over 50,000 years. So this is a really big deal. The interstellar visitor entered our solar system
1:29.3	from above the plane of the planets,
1:31.3	coming from the direction of the constellation Lyra,
1:33.3	and it passed closest to the sun on September 9th,
1:37.3	passing inside the orbit of Mercury.
1:40.3	Now, this isn't a particularly close approach or unusual distance.
1:44.8	It's just much easier to see objects close by.
	...

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