"Io" Episode of Wonders of the Solar System on TV Tonight

Just a quick reminder to my readers in the US that the "Io" episode of the Science Channel mini-series, Wonders of the Solar System, is on tonight at 9pm EDT/6pm PDT. An encore presentation will air at 12am EDT/9pm PDT in case you missed it the first go around. The five-part series, a production of the BBC, is hosted by Brian Cox, a particle physicist from the Univ. of Manchester. The show aired back in its home country earlier this year. The episode is actually titled, "Dead or Alive", and the topic up for discussion is planetary geology.  In addition to the extensive discussion of Io's volcanism, the episode also focuses on volcanism on Mars, Venus, and the Earth as well as impact cratering on the Earth.  If you get the Science Channel (preferably in HD) from your cable, fiber optic, or satellite TV provider, then I would definitely recommend checking it out tonight.  The last episode, which airs next Wednesday, will focus on the potential habitability of Europa and Mars and the influence water has had in shaping many of the worlds of our solar system.

To get a feel for what to expect, one of the people on the BBC Two film crew who produced the series posted some behind the scenes videos on Youtube from the shoot at Erta'ale in Ethiopia:



All I will say is that people who put on gas masks for just a wee bit of sulfur dioxide are silly! Come on! That sulfuric acid that is created in your lungs will put hair on your chest! You wouldn't see Morgan Freeman using a gas mask if he did one of his Wormhole shows from Erta'ale. And in the second video, I have that book! Not the Ethiopia one, the other one! I even wrote a review of it a couple of years back.

One other reminder is that the series will be coming out on Blu-ray and DVD on September 7. Not sure if these are the BBC Two versions that will be released in the US, as they are about 15 minutes longer due to the lack of commercials breaking up the fun.

The Mud Volcano from the Carnival of Wonders of the Solar System

I just wanted to throw up a few quick notes from the news and other blogs this Wednesday evening:

The Cumbrian Sky, a great astronomy blog by Stuart Atkinson, is this week's host of the Carnival of Space.  Check it out for some great photos taken over the last week from the Opportunity rover, still trucking along through Barsoom on its way to Endurance crater.  The Carnival of Space is a series of posts that is hosted each week by a different space or astronomy blog.  These posts highlight the best articles in the space and astronomy blogosphere that week.  This week, the Carnival of Space looks at the near-future of space exploration, the anniversary of the Voyager encounters with Saturn, and the distinction between Earth-like planets and Earth-sized planets (Stuart's own post on this latter topic has the funniest scientific graphic involving a kitten ever made).

Speaking of blogs, Emily Lakdawalla's Planetary Society blog has a new post up in reporting on the possibility of mud volcanoes in northern plains of Mars.  I personally assumed they were pingos, but Emily's article, covering a paper by Oehler and Allen, makes mud volcanoes as the origin of the many flat, rounded mounds that dot the lands seem pretty reasonable.  I am not a Martian geologist so I can provide any useful commentary, however.  Mud volcanoes are cool though.

Finally, the documentary series, Wonders of the Solar System, is premiering tonight here in the United States on the Science Channel.  I brought this up a couple of week ago on this blog, and you can see that original post to view a trailer for the five part series.  The show airs at 9pm EDT/6pm PDT, and re-airs for an encore at 12am EDT/9pm PDT.  The first episode is called, "The Empire of the Sun," and covers solar science and the long reach of the sun in the solar system through the solar wind and the Sun's magnetic field.  The other four episodes of the series air over the next four Wednesday at the same times.

• Wednesday, August 11: "Order out of Chaos" - the formation of the Solar System; Saturn's rings
• Wednesday, August 18: "The Thin Blue Line" - Planetary atmospheres
• Wednesday, August 25: "Dead or Alive" - Planetary geology (impact cratering, volcanism, long segment on Io)
• Wednesday, September 1: "Aliens" - Astrobiology, Water, the Mars/Europa episode

Link: Carnival of Space #165 [cumbriansky.wordpress.com]

"Wonders of the Solar System" Airing in the US

The popular BBC Two series, "Wonders of the Solar System", is finally making its way to this side of the Atlantic.  The first episode, "Empire of the Sun" premieres on the Science Channel on Wednesday, August 4 at 9pm EDT/6pm PDT.  The show, hosted by Brian Cox, was well received when it aired in the UK earlier this year.  It covers various aspects of planetary science, from the Sun in the first episode, the formation of the Solar System and Saturn's rings in the second, planetary atmospheres in the third, geology in the fourth, and the role of water for life on Earth and elsewhere in the fifth.  A significant section on Io, its volcanic activity, and the terrestrial lava lake analog at Erta'Ale will air in the fourth episode, "Dead or Alive."

Thankfully, while it looks like they have changed the music, the world-wide version will have the same host as the BBC one, though given that he is an on air host, I don't really see how else you can do it.  But at least they are not replacing him with Oprah.

In addition to airing next month, the series will also be released on Blu-ray and DVD on September 7.  Strangely enough, the Blu-ray version is cheaper on Amazon.com than the DVD.  Good news for me ;-)

Tip o' the hat to Ashley Davies for the tip!

Here is the trailer for the new series:

Impact mini-series on ABC: Oh the stupidity

My brain hurts now after this IQ damaging video. I mean, every scene, every scene in this trailer is just wrong, wrong in every way. Piece of brown dwarf?!? Hyper-mass?!? This is the kind of sci-fi I would expect if we were living in the world of the movie "Idiocracy". Though it may be worth watching this mini-series, premiering on ABC next Sunday, just for the camp value.

Sorry, I just had to share this video. I am not responsible for any damaged keyboards or monitors from your spit takes.

Tip of the hat to Phil Plait.

Cosmos on Hulu and Io from Australia

The 1980 television series, Cosmos, is now available on Hulu in its entirety. The series, hosted by Carl Sagan, was a landmark series for its time, introducing many Americans and people around the world to the wonders of astronomy and planetary science. The videos are only available to people in the US, though I am sure there are proxy servers for non-US people to get around that, but you may have an easier time getting series off of iTunes. To be honest though, Cosmos never influenced me as greatly as it has many other people. In fact, I never even saw an episode of it until I watched the Jupiter/Saturn episode, Travelers' Tales yesterday. What I found most interesting was the part where Sagan is sitting down with Larry Soderblom, discussing dark spots on Europa and whether certain features were impact craters or potential geyser sites. Nice to see Sagan break character a bit ;-)

The shows are updated at the end with some info on results from the 1980s, though some of the graphics have definitely been updated as recently as the late 1990s (the Galileo images of Europa kinda give that away). Still definitely worth checking out at least as a reminder of how far this field has come in the last 30 years.

In completely unrelated news, astronomers in the Philippines and Australia continue to turn their telescopes to Jupiter now that the planet is moving further and further from the Sun from Earth's perspective. Anthony Wesley captured a great view on March 21 of Jupiter with Io transiting across the giant planet. Io is the faint orange spot to the left of the dark spot near the center of Jupiter's disk. Io's shadow is the dark spot further to the left.

Tip of the hat to Phil Plait.

Link: Cosmos on Hulu [www.hulu.com]

Naked Science: Journey to Jupiter Follow-up

So yesterday, I reminded all of you to check out the National Geographic Channel show Naked Science, which had a new episode last night titled, "Journey to Jupiter". The show covered results from the Galileo mission at Jupiter and how unanswered questions from that mission have led to a host of new missions planned for the giant planet.

Overall, I thought the show was quite decent, if a bit uneven in its coverage. I thought the first half of the show covering the planet itself was excellent. The show presented several mysteries regarding Jupiter, its origins, and how it fits in with the formation and evolution of the solar system. These include the Galileo probe results which have led to the theory that Jupiter has migrated inward from the outer solar system, Shoemaker-Levy 9 observations that provided evidence for the amount of water in Jupiter's atmosphere (which the Galileo probe failed to obtain because it flew through an abnormal dry hotspot), and cloud tracking results which show how large storms evolve and persist on Jupiter. The episode also showed how lingering questions from the areas of interest have led to the development of Juno, a mission scheduled for launch in 2011. Again, the show's producers did a great job with Jupiter, in my opinion. However, since I am less familiar with gas planet research in general, I may not be in the best position to judge that parts effectiveness.

The second half of the episode was dedicated to Jupiter's four largest moons: Io, Europa, Ganymede, and Callisto. During this part, I felt the show faultered a bit. No, I am not criticising it for only dedicating 4 or 5 minutes, at best, to Io, and 15 minutes to Europa. I accept the fact that Europa may generate more interest from shows such as this, and I am not going to criticise them for the editorial choice on how much to time to give each moon. However, I felt that the style of coverage, presenting a few new results from Galileo and looking at remaining mysteries, didn't carry over as well from the Jupiter half of the show to the satellite part, particularly the Io section. What do we learn instead from the Io section: Io has active volcanism (a surprise!) and that it is powered by tidal flexing of the moon's interior. Okay, but what about the results from Galileo? Surely, there were new results from Galileo or other aspects of Io that could be touched on briefly. Sulfur vs. silcates? High-temperature volcanism? Maybe the radiation effects on Galileo? Nothing. Io has active volcanism and it is powered by tidal flexing. Ganymede and Callisto faired a bit better, with a brief discussion of the results regarding their interiors and Ganymede's magnetic field.

The last 15 minutes of the show were dedicated to Europa. Fine, okay, I think I can live if Europa gets her moment in the Sun. I think the biggest issue with the section may not be the producers' fault, the show was clearly completed well before the flagship downselection, but the show did spend some time discussing what a Europa orbiter would accomplish. I am a bit envious that Bob P. got to play around with huge blocks of ice (while two guys in the background tried to pretend there wasn't a film crew in their lab, from experience, 10 bucks they are pretending to work so they get to be in the shot). In my turn at being interviewed for on of these types of programs, all I got to do was point at a map or point at a computer screen (or be one of those people in the background pretending to work). Anyways, the Europa section does do a decent job in presenting the geological finding of Galileo, then it delves into astrobiology. Say it with me children, "Water DOES NOT EQUAL life." Now, keep saying that until you get it. I swear, it is like nails to a chalkboard whenever someone implies that. True, they did touch on the fact that Europa might have accessible raw materials that would be needed for native life. So I give them kudos for that (they even mentioned CO2, good on them). Now with that being said, the end of the show does present us with a potential future mission to Europa, a sub-surface submarine, by looking at a prototype being used on Earth. It presents the issues with such a mission, such as the need for autonomy and the heat source required for the sub to tunnel its way down through Europa's ice shell. Still, it would have been better, I think, for the show to stick with missions that are in the reasonable near-future.

This new episode of Naked Science covering Jupiter and its moons clearly focused on the planet itself and Europa. Jovian science was well-presented from this outsiders perspective, but more care could have been done to present some of the on-going mysteries about the satellites, particularly Io, where I felt too much time was spent explaining just the basics of tidal heating.