Anna: Welcome to Astronomy Daily, your
source for the latest space and astronomy
news. I'm Anna.
Avery: And I'm Avery. Thanks for joining us on this
Thursday, February 29, 2026.
We've got a fascinating lineup today covering
everything from Mercury's surprising
geological activity to a possible
asteroid impact on the M Moon.
Anna: That's right. We're going to explore bright
streaks on Mercury that suggest our
smallest planet is still geologically
active. Cheque in on NASA's TESS
satellite after a command error temporarily
sidelined it and discuss the discovery of an
intriguing Earth like exoplanet that's
much colder than you might expect.
Avery: Plus, we'll bring you updates on NASA and
SpaceX. Moving up the Crew 12 launch to help
out the Skeleton crew currently on the
International Space Station. Then we'll dive
into the wild world of runaway black holes
tearing through space and wrap up with what
could be a once in a lifetime scientific
opportunity if an asteroid hits the moon in
2020 32.
Anna: It's quite a ride.
Today, let's get started with some surprising
news from the innermost planet in our solar
system.
Avery: Mercury has long been viewed as a small,
geologically dead world, but new research
is challenging that assumption in a big way.
A team led by researchers at the University
of Bern has uncovered hundreds of bright
linear streaks on crater slopes that point to
ongoing volcanic activity and and volatile
laws from Mercury's interior.
Anna: This is really fascinating work, Avery.
The team applied deep learning techniques to
analyse about 100,000 high
resolution images taken by NASA's
messenger spacecraft during its orbital
mission from 2011 to 2015.
Using this automated approach, they mapped
the global distribution of roughly
400 bright streaks that had previously
escaped comprehensive cataloguing.
Avery: And what they found was pretty telling. These
features, known as slope lineae, occur
preferentially on sun facing slopes inside
relatively young impact craters that cut
through thick volcanic deposits. The
concentration of streaks in these thermally
stressed environments indicates that solar
heating is an important trigger for volatile
escape from near surface layers.
Anna: Much of these streaks originate in small
bright depressions called hollows that dot
crater floors and walls. These hollows have
long been interpreted as products of volatile
loss, and their close association with the
lineae supports the view that both structures
form when volatile components like sulphur
or other light elements escape from the
subsurface.
Avery: According to the research team, fracture
networks created by the original impact
events likely provide pathways that allow
volatile rich material from deeper levels to
reach the surface. Uh, as solar radiation
warms these exposed zones, volatiles can
escape into space, driving the development or
modification of the Bright streaks downslope.
Anna: What's particularly exciting is the
timing. This research arrives just as the
joint ESA and JAXA uh, Becky Colombo
mission is en route to Mercury. The mission
carries an advanced payload that includes
several key contributions from the University
of Bernard.
Avery: Absolutely. The Becky Colombo Laser Altimeter
or bela, was designed and built in part
at the University of Bern. It will use laser
pulses from an orbit roughly a thousand
kilometres above the surface to measure
elevations with about 10 centimetre
precision, enabling a uh, detailed
reconstruction of Mercury's topography.
Anna: The Bern team also contributed the ion
optical system for STROFEO, a NASA
mass spectrometer on BepiColombo that will m
measure the composition of Mercury's
extremely thin atmosphere, connecting
present day volatile escape at the surface to
the surrounding exosphere.
Avery: The research team plans to use the current
inventory of slope streaks as a baseline for
future comparisons once BepiColombo begins
returning data by imaging key regions
again, they aim to determine whether new
streaks have formed or existing ones have
changed since the MESSENGER era. Any such
changes would provide strong evidence that
volatile driven processes are still
reshaping Mercury's surface on human time
timescales.
Anna: It's a great reminder that even our smallest
closest planetary neighbour still has secrets
to reveal. Mercury is far more dynamic than
we thought.
Avery: Shifting from Mercury to uh, our planet
hunting efforts, NASA's Transiting Exoplanet
Survey Satellite, or TESS, recently had a bit
of a scare when a command error temporarily
knocked it offline.
Anna: Right. The spacecraft was forced into safe
mode after an unexpected command error caused
its solar panels to misalign with the sun.
This misalignment had serious consequences
because the panels were unable to charge
tess's batteries, leading to a low power
condition that triggered the automatic
transition to safe mode.
Avery: In safe mode, all non essential systems are
turned off to conserve power and the
spacecraft awaits further instructions from
ground controllers. NASA engineers quickly
worked to resolve the issue and fortunately
tess's safe mode performed as intended,
protecting the spacecraft from permanent
damage.
Anna: This incident is actually reminiscent of past
missin failures. Remember Viking 1 back
in 1982? A uh, faulty command caused the
loss of communication and there was that
catastrophic series of events that nearly
destroyed the Soho probe in 1998.
But unlike those cases, TESS was fortunate
to have safeguards in place.
Avery: Exactly. The spacecraft's automatic safe
mode kicked in when the power situation
became critical. The safe mode is designed to
preserve the spacecraft's core functions such
as attitude control and ensure it can be
reactivated once engineers identify and
address the issue.
Anna: According to NASA, the mission team is now
reviewing and updating procedures to prevent
this command error from happening in the
future. It's a good reminder that even with
advanced technology, human error remains a
significant challenge in space operations.
Avery: Absolutely. While tess's recovery was
successful and demonstrates how far space
mission technology has come, this incident
emphasises the need for continued vigilance
in mission planning. The risk of human error
is always there, and the consequences can be
costly in terms of both time and resources.
Anna: The good news is that TESS is back online and
continuing its important work of hunting for
exoplanets. Which brings us nicely to our
next storey about a newly discovered Earth
like world.
Avery: Speaking of exoplanets, astronomers have just
discovered what might be one of the closest
things we have to Earth's twin. Though it's
considerably colder than our home.
Anna: Planet, the Exoplanet is called
HD13710B
and it's located 146 light years
away. It's slightly larger than Earth and
orbits a star that resembles our Sun.
However, despite its similarities to Earth in
terms of size and orbital period, its surface
could be far colder than even Mars,
potentially reaching a frigid minus 90
degrees Fahrenheit or minus 68 degrees
Celsius.
Avery: This discovery was published in the
Astrophysical Journal Letters and was made by
an international team led by Alexander
Venner. The search for Earth, like
exoplanets, has been a central focus of
astronomical research for over three decades
now.
Anna: Dr. Huang, a key member of the research team,
explained it well when he said, since the
discovery of the first exoplanet 30 years
ago, we've always tried to find Earth's
Trinity. HD13007 010
b could bring us closer to that goal.
Although it's not an exact match, the.
Avery: Planet is positioned in what astronomers call
the habitable zone of its star, which is the
area where water could potentially exist in
liquid form, which is crucial for life as we
know it. However, there's a major obstacle
right the.
Anna: Star HD
137010B
orbits is cooler and dimmer than our sun,
meaning the planet receives only a fraction
of the energy Earth does. This could result
in surface temperatures as low as
-90 degrees Fahrenheit, making it one
of the coldest exoplanets discovered in
recent years.
Avery: But scientists remain hopeful. Dr.
Venner pointed out that while the planet's
surface might be frozen, it could still fall
within the broader optimistic habitable zone
of its star. With the right atmospheric
conditions,
HD137010B
might not be as inhospitable as its
temperature suggests.
Anna: One of the challenges of studying this planet
is its orbital distance from its star, which
is similar to Earth's but much farther than
the typical exoplanets that are easier to
observe. Transits when the planet crosses
in front of its star happen less frequently,
making it harder to confirm the planet's
existence.
Avery: The discovery was made from a single Transit
captured by NASA's Kepler Space Telescope.
Further confirmation of the planet's
existence and detailed analysis of its mass
and atmosphere will require more data, which
might not be possible until the next
generation of telescopes become operational.
Anna: It's an exciting discovery that adds to our
understanding of the types of environments
where life could potentially exist beyond our
solar system. Even if
HD137010B
is too cold for life as we know it, it
teaches us valuable lessons about planetary
habitability.
Avery: Now let's turn our attention back to Earth
orbit and the International Space Station.
NASA has announced an earlier than expected
target date to launch the next astronauts to
the ISS.
Anna: That's right, the agency is now targeting
February 11 for liftoff of SpaceX
Crew 12 mission, which will fly four
astronauts to join the skeleton crew
presently operating the orbital.
That's four days earlier than originally
planned.
Avery: Just to give everyone context, currently only
three crew members are covering the
maintenance and science investigations aboard
the ISS. They were left behind on January
14th by the early departure of Crew 11
on the station's first ever medical
evacuation.
Anna: The M Crew 12 astronauts were already in line
to take the Crew 11's quartet's place, but
they had originally been scheduled to overlap
with them before their return to Earth.
SpaceX and NASA had originally targeted
February 15 for Crew 12's launch, but
managed to get the mission's crew Dragon
spacecraft and Falcon 9 rocket ready ahead
of schedule.
Avery: The Crew 12 team includes NASA
astronauts Jessica Meir, who's the mission
commander, and Jack Hathaway as pilot.
The mission specialists are Sophie Adenot of
the European Space Agency and
Roscosmos cosmonaut Andrei
Fedyayev.
Anna: Interestingly, Fedyav was a relatively late
replacement for cosmonaut Oleg Artemiev, who
was pulled off Crew 12 in early December,
possibly for violating US national security
regulations.
Avery: This quartet will fly the crew Dragon capsule
named Grace to the ISS for a longer than
normal assignment lasting nine months instead
of the typical six months. It'll be the
second spaceflight for both Mayur and Fedyav,
while Hathaway and Adino uh are both
spaceflight rookies headed to orbit for the
first time.
Anna: The launch window opens on February 11th at
6:00am Eastern Time from Launch Complex 40
at Cape Canaveral Space Force Station in
Florida. If they don't manage to launch that
day, there are backup opportunities. On
February 12th and 13th, the Crew.
Avery: 12 astronauts will join NASA, Chris Williams
and cosmonauts Sergey Kud Sverskov and
Sergei Mikayev as part of ISS
Expedition 74, which will eventually
transition to Expedition 75 before
the end of Crew 12's rotation station. It's
great to see the relief crew heading up
sooner to help out the skeleton crew
currently managing the station.
Anna: Now for something truly mind bending.
Astronomers have confirmed the first runaway
supermassive black hole and it's leaving
quite a trail behind it.
Avery: This is wild stuff, Anna. Uh, the black
hole was identified by a 200,000 light
year tail and a supersonic bow shock in the
Cosmic Owl galaxy, which is actually a
pair of ring galaxies about 8.8 billion
light years away. The rings appear as
owlized as they get closer and closer to
merging.
Anna: The research led by Peter von Dockam, um,
from Yale's Astronomy Department, was
confirmed using observations from the James
Webb Space Telescope. The central
proposal is that this linear feature is the
wake behind a runaway supermassive black
hole. And this is strongly supported by their
analysis.
Avery: But how does something weighing potentially
millions or even billions of times the mass
of our sun get kicked out of a galaxy? The
answer lies in galaxy mergers. When big
galaxies collide and merge, they force the
black holes at their respective centres into
close proximity.
Anna: Right. If two black holes become locked in a
gravitational dance and then a third crashes
in from another merging galaxy, the resulting
instability can hurl one of the trio away at
sufficient speed to exit the host galaxy
entirely. This can happen through two main
mechanisms.
Avery: The first is gravitational wave recoil.
When black holes merge, they emit uh,
gravitational waves that can give the
resulting black hole a velocity boost of up
to several thousand kilometres per second,
propelling it away from the galactic centre.
Anna: The second mechanism is the classical
slingshot scenario. In this case, a long
lived binary black hole forms through a
merger of two galaxies when a third
supermassive black hole is introduced. In a
second merger, the three body interaction can
eject one of the black holes, usually the
lightest one.
Avery: What's particularly striking about this
confirmed runaway black hole is the trail it
leaves behind. As the black hole ploughs
through intergalactic space, it compresses
tenuous gas in front of it, which
precipitates the birth of hot blue stars.
This creates a 200,000 light year long
contrail of young stars.
Anna: The black hole also generates a bow shock at
the head of this week, something the
researchers predicted based on shock models
from the ages of the stars in the trail. They
deduce that the black hole escaped about 40
million years ago and is barreling through
space at roughly 1600 kilometres per
second.
Avery: To put that in perspective, that's fast
enough to travel from Earth to the moon in
about 14 minutes. It's an incredible
speed for something so massive.
Anna: Recent papers have shown images of
surprisingly straight streaks of stars within
galaxies that seem to be convincing evidence
for runaway black holes. One paper describes
a very distant galaxy imaged by James Webb
with a bright contrail, suggesting a black
hole with a mass 10 million times the mass
of the sun.
Avery: It's a reminder that the universe is even
more dynamic and violent than we often
imagine. These behemoths aren't just sitting
quietly at the centres of galaxies. Some of
them are literally tearing through space,
creating new stars in their wake.
Anna: And finally, let's talk about an upcoming
event that has both exciting scientific
potential and some concerning risks.
On 12-22-2032,
asteroid 2024 yr 4
has a 4% chance of actually striking
the Moon.
Avery: A 4% chance might not sound like much, but
it's definitely non negligible. If this
collision does happen, it will release enough
energy to be the equivalent of smacking our
nearest neighbour with a medium sized
thermonuclear weapon. It would be six
orders of magnitude more powerful than the
last major impact on the moon, which happened
back in 2013.
Anna: A uh, new paper from Yifan he of Tsinghua
University looks at the potential scientific
opportunities if this collision occurs. And
while they can simulate models of how the
impact will go, monitoring it as it happens
will provide never before collected actual
data that's infeasible to get any other way.
Avery: The impact would vaporise rock and plasma and
would be clearly visible from the Pacific
region where it will be nighttime during the
impact. Even days after the impact, the
melt pool of the impacted material will still
be cooling, allowing infrared observers like
the James Webb Space Telescope to capture
plenty of data.
Anna: The impact should form a crater roughly one
kilometre wide and 150 to
260 metres deep, with a 100
metre pool of molten rock at the centre.
Comparing it in size to other craters
scattered around the moon will help us
understand its bombardment history.
Avery: The impact will also set off a global
moonquake of magnitude 5.0 that
would be the strongest moonquake yet detected
by any seismometer on the Moon. Watching the
propagation of the moonquake will shine a
light on the Moon's interior and help
researchers understand its composition.
Anna: And here's where it gets really spectacular.
A final piece of the scientific puzzle will
be the debris field created by the blast. Up
to 400 kilogrammes of lunar material
is expected to survive re entry to Earth,
creating essentially a free large scale
lunar sample return mission.
Avery: At its peak right around Christmas of 2032,
simulations expect up to 20 million meteors
per hour to hit our atmosphere, at least on
the leading edge of the planet. Most of them
would have naked eye visibility, including
some 100 to 400 fireballs per hour.
Anna: But there is a downside to all of this that
400 kilogrammes of meteors has to land
somewhere, and it looks like the crosshairs
fall squarely on South America, North Africa
and the Arabian Peninsula. A few kilogrammes
of space rock falling on Dubai could
certainly cause some damage.
Avery: Perhaps more dangerous is the risk of
satellite mega constellations that play such
an important role in our modern day
navigation and Internet systems. Such an
event could trigger Kessler Syndrome and
bring the entire network down over the span
of a few short years, while also locking us
out from being able to get anything else
safely into orbit for much longer.
Anna: Due to the risks, some space agencies are
already considering a deflection mission that
would bump asteroid 2024 yr 4
out of the way of a potential lunar
collision. But that hasn't been set in stone
yet. Neither has the actual impact itself,
with only a 4% chance of happening.
Avery: If the odds increase over the coming years,
we as a species will have to decide whether
it's worth it to deflect it or not. If we
do, we might miss out on a whole bunch of
cool science, but we also might save our
entire orbital infrastructure and the few
lives directly to boot.
Anna: And that wraps up today's episode of
Astronomy Daily. From Mercury's surprising
activity to a possible lunar impact in our
future, space continues to surprise and
amaze us.
Avery: Thanks for joining us today. For more space
news and to explore our archive of episodes,
visit our website@astronomydaily.IO.
you can also find us on social media,
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Anna: If you enjoyed today's show, please subscribe
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enthusiasts find us. Until next time, keep
looking up clear skies everyone.
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