00:00Hello everyone, my name is Teresa Polterva, I'm a senior writer at Space.com and today I have
00:04something really special for you. I'm here with Sir Brian May, the rock legend of Queen, who also
00:10happens to be a part-time astronomer and he was one of the scientists working with data and images
00:17coming from NASA's OSIRIS-REx mission. OSIRIS-REx was NASA's first mission to collect a sample from
00:25an asteroid and it will soon deliver this sample to Earth. And Sir Brian actually worked with Dante
00:32Loretta, OSIRIS-REx's chief investigator, on a beautiful new book about asteroid Bennu and he is
00:41here now with us to tell us everything about this book and his collaboration with OSIRIS-REx. Thank
00:48you very much for finding time to talk to us, it's a great pleasure. So let me start at the beginning.
00:53Hugh and OSIRIS-REx, how did the two of you get together? Well, quite informally really, because
01:00I'm on the outside of NASA and nobody pays me to do this, but I love it. And I and my collaborator,
01:08Claudia Manzoni, generally go around the internet to find things which we can make into stereos,
01:16because the data is all there from all these different missions, from NASA, from ESA, from JAXA.
01:20There is enough data there to find viewpoints in order to make the stereo images, which we crave.
01:27We just love making stereo images. And of course, then you have to use a viewer to appreciate them in 3D.
01:34And I mean, I'm creator of the London Stereoscopic Company, and we now make stereo viewers, we make 3D viewers.
01:44So what happened with me and Dante was I sent him just off the cuff, a couple of his images, which I'd made into 3D, along with Claudia.
01:53And he was amazed. He said, I've never seen them like this. This is such a great tool.
01:58And this might be able to help us find the landing site that we need in order to get our samples safely.
02:04And so we started to interact and we started to trade emails and pictures.
02:09And from that point on, I mean, we've become very good friends during the passage of time, but a lot of work, because when it became serious, we're not just making pretty pictures.
02:20We're supplying them with images that they can view and make that crucial decision.
02:25Is this a flat enough site to land our spacecraft? Will it be safe? Will we get the sample back to Earth?
02:31So that's what I became engaged doing. And a lot of work, but very, very happy work.
02:36Is there any particular reason why you are interested in this mission?
02:40I'm interested in them all.
02:42I was incredibly lucky to be involved in the New Horizons mission with Alan Stern, who also kind of took me under his wing.
02:49And I was able to help secure 3D pictures of Pluto.
02:54See, no one had ever seen Pluto close up before.
02:56So I was able to bring, I think, the universe's first 3D picture of Pluto to light.
03:05And they went on to photograph an object in the Kuiper belts, as you probably know.
03:09But yes, Rosetta also, we've made some lovely stereo images of.
03:13Maybe there's a book there too.
03:15I think the difference is that Dante wanted to involve me and involve us at an early stage so that we could actually contribute to the conduct of the mission.
03:25That's the crucial difference.
03:26I understand that you were actually called upon to help the team solve a major issue they had trying to find a suitable landing spot on the surface of an asteroid that looked very different than they expected it to.
03:39Do you remember how the atmosphere was among the scientists during this challenging time?
03:44Yeah, well, I think it was suddenly becoming much more difficult than they'd expected, because Bennu wasn't a solid object with flat places.
03:53It was a completely randomly accrued object.
03:57It's a rubble pile.
03:58And there are no places where it's safe to land, apparently.
04:01There's only two different sizes of pebbles.
04:06And it's very difficult to assess what the landing will actually be like if you can't be there and see it with your own eyes.
04:12That's where this comes in handy.
04:14Because once you have a stereo image of that particular potential landing site, you can really make an instinctive judgment as to whether things are going to work out or not.
04:23You know, how near is this boulder?
04:24How much slope is there?
04:26How dangerous is it to be to get it off and get on?
04:29And so that's where we were able to get into it.
04:33And I know that at one point, Dante said, look, all my guys have to see this.
04:37I've seen it.
04:38This has changed my whole opinion.
04:39I want my whole team to see this.
04:41So I sent about a box of these.
04:43And everybody sat around the table, I think, and made those decisions looking at Bennu as if they were there.
04:50So can you explain to us how do you create these stereo images?
04:53Basically, to make a stereo image, you need two different viewpoints.
04:57Just as in real life, when I look at you, my left eye has a viewpoint and my right eye has a viewpoint.
05:02Slightly different.
05:04I see more of your cheek here.
05:06More of your cheek here.
05:07And that's the whole thing.
05:09I mean, I've said it there.
05:12What you have to do in making a stereo image is to reproduce that effect.
05:16So I have to take a picture from my left eye.
05:18I have to take a picture from my right eye.
05:19And then I put them in a viewer, like this, in a situation where my left eye only sees the left image.
05:25And my right eye only sees the right image.
05:28Then the effect is reproduced.
05:32So I see this crater as if I were about a mile away from Bennu.
05:36But my eyes are about 100,000 miles apart.
05:40No, not that far.
05:42Delete that.
05:43My eyes are about half a mile apart.
05:44So how did the idea for the book come about?
05:48We made so many images.
05:50And it was a labor of love.
05:52And it was also very rushed.
05:54And I remember saying to Dante, we should do the book.
05:57We have such an amazing collection of images.
06:00Not just of the details of the surface.
06:02Also of the whole planet, which is something very attractive.
06:07And so we started to think of a book.
06:11And we realized that it could be the world's first opportunity to make a real atlas of an asteroid.
06:18So that's what we attempted to do.
06:19And the fact that it has stereo images as well, I think, makes it something very unique and special.
06:25So who is the book aimed at?
06:26Who is the target audience?
06:28The book is really aimed at anyone who has an interest in this kind of subject.
06:32Anyone who's interested in what they see when they look up in the night sky.
06:35It's not just for scientists.
06:36There's a lot of, well, there's a whole world of scientific information in there for anyone who wants it.
06:42But if you read it as a story, you should be able to understand it without prior knowledge.
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