- 4 months ago
In Spain she’s a media star. Known as AstroSara on YouTube, Sara García Alonso is a science communicator, author, molecular biologist – and future ESA reserve astronaut. We accompany her as she prepares for the job.
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00:06in Spain she's a science media star for fans of her YouTube channel she's Astro
00:12Sara and Sara Garcia Alonso is not just a science communicator she's also an
00:18author a molecular biologist working in cancer research and a soon-to-be reserve
00:24astronaut for the European Space Agency we joined her for some on-the-job
00:30training and out of this world Korea and much much more coming up on tomorrow
00:39today welcome to the show nothing not even gravity can hold Sara Garcia Alonso
00:49down she and her fellow astronauts are learning how to float I always thought
00:56it was something for other people it seems so far-fetched so unattainable to me
01:00that I never pictured it as a realistic option for a career Sarah is one of 17
01:06participants in the European Space Agency's astronaut training program
01:11selected from over 22,000 scientists who'd applied and now she could become the
01:17first Spanish woman in space like any child who's seen movies about space I
01:24thought wow I'd love to be an astronaut look at what they can do how adventurous
01:29and brave they are but it's very difficult to dream about something you
01:33don't know anything about if there's been nobody before you doing something like
01:38that how can you at the age of 10 think you could be the first person to do it
01:47Sarah has two parallel lives one in Spain where she works as a
01:52molecular biologist the other in Germany she's not only learning how to fly but
02:00also how to survive in hostile conditions I thought the cold weather
02:08survival training was going to be very challenging for me but it's been one of
02:12the best experiences I've ever had we spent a whole week there completely
02:17isolated surrounded by snow-capped mountains and I was proud to make it to
02:22see that with the right techniques you can even feel comfortable learning how to
02:27build a fire in the middle of a forest while it's snowing it was a great
02:30challenge and one that I still have great memories of when the outdoor
02:35challenges are over it's time to get back to the European astronaut Center in
02:39the German city of Cologne though activities at the EAC are not as extreme
02:45the training regimen is stringent
02:50almost every day we have a gym session either in a group or
02:54individually everyone goes and trains there then at the neutral buoyancy
02:59facility we do scuba diving training to simulate conditions in a microgravity
03:04environment so basically each day is completely different from the next but
03:09it's always really interesting that is more interesting the training also
03:14includes theory lessons experiments in different environments familiarizing
03:19yourself with the equipment and learning how to explain to others what you're
03:22doing this whole environment we're in is called the training hall there's a
03:28series of modules that are very similar to the modules that make up the
03:32International Space Station in fact it's on a one-to-one scale on one side
03:37are the modules that we'll be seeing later the Columbus module over here is the
03:42laboratory which is the European Space Agency's contribution to the
03:46International Space Station it's a laboratory with a set of racks for
03:50conducting scientific experiments because they all just look like boxes but some
03:59of them store centrifuges incubators for microorganisms or plants that need to be
04:04kept at a certain temperature and under specific oxygen and co2 conditions all of
04:10this is achieved inside the racks that are distributed throughout these areas
04:16once the training is concluded the astronauts will have to face the
04:20challenges of the career path they've chosen for Sara some of that is already
04:24hitting home when your name is announced along with your 16 other colleagues in
04:31front of all these European ministers and you're on the world stage you lose your
04:35anonymity from then on people are watching you you're an ambassador for the
04:39European Space Agency in your country for science technology and exploration so a
04:45lot of expectations to me I'll do that Sarah Garcia Alonso will wrap up her
04:51training at the end of May 2026 after that all she has to do is wait for ESA's
05:01call now to a different but no less daring kind of scientific exploration as we
05:07take a journey to a seascape ruled by ice and storms the destination sounds like
05:13something from a video game the danger islands in Antarctica and the animals that
05:20live and breed on the remote archipelago are of scientific interest for a range of
05:25reasons time to meet some of them Ushuaia in Tierra del Fuego the southernmost tip of
05:35South America final preparations are underway for an Antarctic adventure aboard
05:43the militia Explorer it's a polar debut for the 26 meter sailing yacht and for its
05:50owner Boris Herrmann of course sailing is my passion as is proving that we can contribute
06:00meaningfully to research with a yacht like this and even reach places more easily than large ships can
06:06like shallow areas or inaccessible coasts that's where a small yacht can get closer in
06:1514 people are on board four crew three journalists and seven scientists the goal is to study the tiny
06:28danger islands five square kilometers of untouched wilderness that was recently designated a specially
06:34protected area the first ever to be overseen by Germany it's small in size but big in importance
06:44it's hard to believe but the world's largest Adelie penguin colony is on these seven islands estimated
06:51at 1.4 million breeding pairs that makes this a top-level protected area category we cast off for the
07:01joint mission between the German Environment Agency and the Alfred Wegener Institute below deck the
07:09researchers explore what will be their new home for the next three to four weeks four of us in here
07:16nice
07:17and cozy a pod of dolphins escorts us as we head for a Cape Horn and the notorious Drake passage
07:25our boat
07:26skips lightly across the waves but not all of us react well
07:33seasickness has hit hard after filming I felt terrible and now I'm sitting here with my bucket
07:41but soon enough the motion calms a little and we reach the Antarctic convergence this is where the
07:49circumpolar current separates Antarctic waters from the rest of the world's oceans for the scientists a
07:55fascinating spot time to drop the CTD rosette an instrument that can dive up to 500 meters below
08:02the surface now you have 19 meters is that what you see on the winch as well on the monitor
08:10the
08:11scientists can track salinity temperature and depth meter by meter we went down here you can see the
08:19temperature dropping sharply then we hit a colder zone minus 0.35 degrees but interestingly deeper
08:27down at 160 meters the water grows warmer again warmer than at the surface the temperature profile is
08:41crucial for understanding currents at different layers we can see which ones rise or sink depending
08:49on temperature these values feed into major earth system models where you have to simulate currents in
08:59order to predict long-term changes weather it can change fast in Antarctica the wind is blowing hard and it
09:11feels
09:11like minus 15 degrees Celsius we seek shelter at the anchor the crew hold tight if something goes wrong here
09:21they can't expect rapid help or a rescue boat I've never experienced anything like this on a sailboat extreme if
09:30something goes wrong you can't do much everything has to work after the storm the impact of climate change grows
09:39starkly visible
09:4050 years ago the glacier on King George Island reached all the way to where we're anchored now a stretch
09:47of water nearly two kilometers
09:48wide lies between us and the coast Antarctica is warming almost twice as fast as the global average and that
09:56has
09:56consequences for the ice oceans and wildlife this mission is about understanding those processes better but our
10:05destination the danger islands is hard to reach satellite images all show the same thing they're surrounded by
10:12pack ice so we'll have to wait after nearly two weeks at sea we decide to risk it and set
10:20course for
10:20the specially protected area navigation takes experience and steady nerves Boris Herrmann searches from above
10:28with a drone looking for a path through the frozen maze it's hardly a passage collisions have to be avoided
10:39as the
10:40the aluminum ship is no icebreaker the atmosphere on board is tense progress is meter by meter
10:49then brash island the westernmost of the seven comes into view who would have thought chances were only
10:58about 50 50 but we pushed our way through we climb into an inflatable dinghy to head over few humans
11:08have ever set foot here
11:09there are plenty of penguins currently on the danger islands mostly the Adelie species which have a distinctive white
11:17eye ring there might be more of them here than anywhere else on earth and its breeding season the scientists
11:24get to
11:25work first carefully attaching satellite trackers to a few birds to study where they feed and they collect eggs to
11:32analyze when
11:33they return to Germany we want to find out whether pollutants that have been produced in
11:41industrial countries and simply released into the environment can be detected here in antarctica
11:47especially chemicals that degrade very slowly or hardly at all like pfas chemicals often called forever
11:55chemicals we may find traces of them in these eggs it's maybe a little cruel to take the penguins eggs
12:02but we only take one when there are two in the nest and right after they've been laid
12:12the scientists also hope the drone will help to answer a key question
12:17are estimates of two million penguins here accurate the number is a crucial climate marker
12:26they feed in the southern ocean and come to land only to breed that makes species like these good indicators
12:37the drone can scan all of the islands from the air but we can't land anywhere else
12:46the ice is everywhere and we have to beat a retreat before becoming trapped
12:54we hope for another chance but the islands remain sealed in ice unreachable
13:03on the return voyage to south america the drake passage lives up to its reputation
13:09five meter waves gale force nine winds like spending days on a roller coaster
13:19the low deck we try to hold on breakfast is adventurous we finally sail back into ushuaia
13:27exhausted but happy loaded with experiences and data to be analyzed in the coming months
13:34the danger islands the danger islands were stunning and you could see the treasure there a true treasure
13:41of nature one we have to protect so it remains as it is the militia explorer and our crew have
13:50survived
13:50the antarctic adventure although the mission managed to reach only one of the seven possible destinations
13:57perhaps one day the sailboat will return to the danger islands where the penguins at least feel at home
14:07along with penguins seals and whales also live in antarctica and they have hairs that act as tactile
14:15sensors helping them navigate and locate prey in their environment in warmer parts of the world a cat's whiskers
14:23fulfill the same function horses and rodents have them as well along with the largest land animals on earth
14:34an elephant's trunk is incredibly dexterous one reason it can work with such remarkable precision
14:41is because of tactile hairs on the sinuous appendages surface
14:48to understand how these hairs function scientists at the max planck institute for intelligence systems
14:55in stuttgart built a 3d model they called the whisker wand with it the researchers were able to feel
15:02things a little like an elephant does
15:08and i was walking to a meeting in our building so i just picked it up
15:11and as a kid might do i just hit some things as i walked and i paid attention to what
15:17i could feel
15:17and i had this eureka moment where i realized that what i felt depended on the location because it's
15:25really hard down here and then you get this stiff sharp feeling and at the tip it's so soft and
15:31that
15:31really we think helps the elephant feel where things touch on its whiskers all over its trunk
15:38to create their model the researchers from stuttgart and berlin examined the real thing whiskers taken
15:46from elephants that had died
15:50the team measured just how elastic the hairs are with the help of an electron microscope
15:58to do so they pressed a tiny diamond cube into the hairs at different points
16:04they discovered an astonishing range of elasticity indicating that material intelligence is at work
16:15what material intelligence highlights is uh when some of the software side of the thinking of the
16:23structure is actually built in to the hardware so the material is helping doing some of the thinking
16:30the elephant's extraordinary whiskers sparked an idea could something similar be used in robotics
16:51might hairs like these one day be employed widely in the field today's robots have almost no sense of touch
17:05the new findings could help researchers build machines with far more highly developed haptic abilities
17:14so we envision giving the robot many whiskers and being able for it to feel where things
17:20are touching so it could pick up a tortilla chip or a small object um a screw a part
17:27it needs to assemble but use these very gentle soft feelers all over its body
17:34that dream remains a distant one at the moment the special material properties exhibited by the hairs on
17:41the trunks of elephants only benefit the animals themselves but they've made scientists curious and
17:48sometimes our instinct to play and experiment leads to unexpected discoveries
17:57a curious mind is vital for research as is asking the right questions like the one sent in by a
18:05viewer in bosnia and herzegovina
18:10why is the sky blue when you look directly at the sun you see white light but that white contains
18:18all the
18:18colors of the rainbow red orange yellow green blue and violet why we see blue light when looking at the
18:26daytime sky has to do with each color's wavelength you can think of it like waves in water some are
18:34longer
18:34than others red for instance has a longer wavelength blue has a shorter one here's how it works
18:43before it can reach your eyes on the earth's surface sunlight has to pass through the air in the
18:49atmosphere which is made up mostly of nitrogen and oxygen the light is scattered when it strikes these
18:56gas molecules deflected in all directions short wavelength blue light keeps bumping into molecules
19:02over and over scattering more and more long wavelength red light passes through more directly
19:09and we only see the parts of the sunlight that are scattered by the air
19:15so the color of the sky depends directly on atmospheric composition other gases and particles could make
19:23the sky look different on mars for example reddish tones dominate during the day
19:33even here on earth the sky often looks red at sunrise and sunset that's because when the sun is low
19:40in
19:41the sky the angle you're looking at it means the light passes through a much longer stretch of
19:46atmosphere than during the day because the blue light is mostly scattered high up we see mostly longer
19:53wavelengths reds oranges and yellows so the atmosphere is what determines the sky's color without it we
20:00would only see white light from the sun and the blackness of outer space
20:07what are stars made of how many colors can butterflies see could robots have babies one day
20:16do you have a science question send it to us as a video text or voice message
20:22if we answer it on the show we'll send you a little thank you gift so just ask
20:31what made people thousands of years ago heave massive stones upright in rows stretching for
20:37kilometers these so-called megaliths remain a mystery new discoveries from the britney region
20:43in northern france are now deepening our understanding of neolithic cultures
20:48and they indicate that all those millennia ago europe was far more connected than we once thought
20:57carnac in northwestern france is home to what are likely europe's most ancient megalithic monuments
21:04some of them over 6 000 years old the latest excavations performed by french archaeologist
21:10audrey planchard and her team are now helping us form an increasingly precise picture of the origins of
21:17megalithic culture on their current dig as is often the case there's little time to waste because
21:24a commercial park is scheduled to expand into the area soon the team has just six months to excavate
21:32they uncover foundations and fragments of large standing stones two of them are of particular
21:38interest to the archaeologists they were carved thousands of years ago and the designs are still
21:44faintly visible but it's often difficult to date them with certitude in this case we are certain that
21:54they date from the neolithic period because they are in place in a megalithic site and in a funerary monument
22:05people settled here during the neolithic era nomadic hunters turned into farmers and herders
22:11and began constructing enormous stone monuments linked to religious practices and communal life
22:19in central europe where stone was more scarce people used wood to build their monumental structures like
22:26here in germany reiko krauss is a specialist in the neolithic period these ceramics from southwestern
22:35germany were made during that time a beautifully decorated piece that was coated with white paste
22:44the archaeologist the archaeologist is currently studying the world's oldest known jewelry the various
22:50items were found in varna on bulgaria's black sea coast a treasure trove created more than 6 000 years ago
22:59this grave contained over 1 000 individual gold objects spectacular even later in the era burials this
23:07opulent were extremely rare researchers at the university of tubingen are compiling a catalog of the extensive
23:15find many of the animal motifs are familiar from other parts of europe these have also been found in
23:25britain these are signs of a shared symbolic world shared imagery common across europe at that time
23:33that's right in europe which one vana on the black sea is around 3000 kilometers away from carnak on the
23:42french
23:43atlantic coast the people knew about each other and there was a great deal of communication between these
23:51regions evidently they shared similar values beliefs and notions about the afterlife they also seem to have
24:00shared a preference for a particular color many of the pieces of jewelry and tools the researchers found
24:06were green what's interesting is that among all the copper and gold objects we found small green axes like
24:14this one this shape is based on a jadeite axe type we know from britney it's a form that's typical
24:21for
24:22western europe the archaeologists back in britain didn't find any green jadeite axes on this site but they did make
24:32another unique discovery after stumbling across the remains of a large circular building
24:39discovery is so significant because it's the first time that we found this type of circular building
24:45which was more common in the paris basin maybe a symbolic place linked to the standing stone or the alignment
24:54of karnak
24:56the neolithic inhabitants of britney built this structure out of wood a massive building that
25:02must have been visible from a great distance like a cathedral experts estimate it was around 20 meters high
25:10a mammoth undertaking we also know that these large constructions took time were built in several
25:17stages and required a large number of people the new dig in the region around karnak reveals that the
25:25complex was much larger than what remains visible today archaeologists are eager to continue searching
25:32in the waters off the coast of britney for traces of megalithic culture because sea levels were much
25:38lower 6 000 years ago so many spectacular discoveries may still be hidden beneath the waves
25:49that's it for now but thanks for watching and see you next time for further adventures on tomorrow today
25:56bye bye
26:08bye
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