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Interesting facts about space that you need to know!
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00:00It all started with a minor change on our planet.
00:02At first, people noticed the moon had become brighter and a little bigger.
00:07But nobody paid attention to this.
00:09The moon affected tides all over the world.
00:12The water flooded the beaches, but it wasn't a tragedy.
00:16A lot of fish came close to the shores.
00:19People found giant squid, anglerfish, and other creatures next to the coast,
00:24although they usually live in the dark depths.
00:27New, stranger things happen every day.
00:30Birds no longer fly to the south in winter.
00:33They gather in huge groups, flying around cities with no purpose.
00:37The moon used to help them navigate in nature,
00:40so they can't figure out which way to fly anymore.
00:43In the boundless waters of the world's oceans,
00:46ship captains noticed that compasses are now unstable.
00:50The arrow is pointing in different directions,
00:52since the Earth's magnetic poles have changed.
00:55People realize the moon has started to approach Earth for an unknown reason.
01:01The moon's gravity affects the gravity of our planet.
01:04This entails changes in the climate,
01:06the behavior of all living beings, and the magnetic field.
01:10Now, it rains in the driest places and gets hot in the coldest lands.
01:16It's knocking down ecosystems all over the planet.
01:19People living near forests hear wolves howling all the time.
01:23The moon drives these animals mad.
01:26The Earth's natural satellite is growing in size and lights up the night much brighter.
01:32Nothing critical has happened yet.
01:34People don't panic because they don't want to believe the end is coming.
01:38But then, one day, the moon reaches a critical point.
01:43You're walking down the street, listening to music.
01:46And, at that moment, someone pushes you.
01:49Okay, maybe that guy is late for work.
01:51You keep walking, and a girl coming by hits your shoulder.
01:55I'm sorry, she says, and goes away.
01:58You've noticed the fear in her eyes.
02:00You look ahead and see people running towards you.
02:03You take off your headphones and hear screams and sirens.
02:07People leave their cars and run away.
02:10Hundreds of seagulls are flying in the sky.
02:13You hear a strange noise among all the sounds of chaos.
02:17It seems to be water.
02:20How is this possible?
02:21You're in the city center, a few miles from the shore.
02:24But there's no time to think.
02:26You notice a huge wave flooding the streets and heading straight to you.
02:31You run into a building and go up to the 10th floor.
02:34From here, you're watching the water filling the city.
02:38The strong stream blows all cars, one-story buildings, and trees off the road.
02:44You notice a shark and other fish in the water.
02:47People are hiding in houses and on the roofs.
02:50The whole city is quickly plunging into a catastrophe.
02:53The TV is working in the building where you're hiding.
02:56You learn that floods are occurring all over the world.
03:00Massive tsunamis cover coastal cities.
03:03In some places, waves reach the height of a 30-story building.
03:07Many towns have been washed off the face of the Earth.
03:11The Moon is too close to Earth, and massive floods are just the beginning.
03:16The Moon flies around Earth and helps to keep our home on its axis.
03:20The Moon provides climate stability and helps living organisms develop.
03:24But now, this balance is broken.
03:27The Moon is approaching and changing our planet's gravity.
03:31Earth can tilt slightly to the side and provoke massive floods around the world.
03:36Imagine that you're holding a round glass of water.
03:39Tilt it a little.
03:40See how the liquid moves from one side to another?
03:43The same thing is happening now with the oceans.
03:46But the Moon is not just approaching us.
03:49It's flying around the planet and getting closer with each circle.
03:54It causes natural disasters in different locations on Earth all the time.
03:59Now the ocean floods one side, and a few hours later, another.
04:03So, you see all the water going back from the streets to the shore.
04:08The oceans may return to the city again by the end of the day.
04:11Wait a minute.
04:13It seems the end of the day has already come.
04:16You notice that the sky has become dark.
04:18It's weird, because it's only 3 p.m.
04:21The Moon changes Earth's rotation speed and makes the day go faster.
04:26The Moon covers almost the entire sky and brightly illuminates our planet.
04:32You see huge lunar craters.
04:34It's so close that you can still see it, even when the sun shines.
04:38In some places, the passing Moon obscures the sun.
04:42The water is leaving the streets, and everyone goes outside.
04:46At this moment, an earthquake begins.
04:49The road is cracking, and the houses are collapsing.
04:52There are landslides on the street.
04:55Tectonic plates are shifting all over the planet.
04:58Imagine two magnetic balls that are approaching each other.
05:01So, one ball is the Moon, and the second one is Earth's core.
05:05What do you think will happen to what's above the core?
05:09That's hundreds of thousands of miles of the Earth's crust.
05:13And now, it's all moving.
05:15Destructive cracks are emerging all over the world.
05:18The planet's highest mountains break down and turn into a pile of stones.
05:23The seabed cracks and releases magma from the underground depths.
05:28Volcanoes wake up and erupt magma.
05:31Clouds of volcanic ash cover the sky from the sun and the glowing Moon.
05:36But the scariest thing is still ahead.
05:38A collision is inevitable.
05:41The Moon flies around the planet like a ball in a round glass with a hole in the center.
05:46This force drives clouds all over the planet.
05:49Now there's a thunderstorm, but in five minutes, it will be snowing.
05:53Then the night comes, and it starts raining.
05:57Water droplets consist of mud and volcanic ash.
06:00It's difficult for people to breathe without gas masks.
06:04Atmospheric pressure is constantly changing.
06:06Some people experience severe migraines, and some have sore joints.
06:11But there's no time to think about your health.
06:13Humanity needs to figure out how to save itself from the collision.
06:17A new gravitational order will come when the Moon crashes into Earth.
06:21Continents will change their shape.
06:24They will combine into one giant piece of land, or split into a hundred smaller ones.
06:29The energy of the collision can burn all the oxygen in the atmosphere,
06:33and make the planet unsuitable for life.
06:36Hiding underground also makes no sense because of deep earthquakes.
06:41People decide to spend their last hours with loved ones and their families.
06:45The Moon is getting closer.
06:47It's now at the same distance as the International Space Station.
06:50The Moon covers the sky.
06:53Many cities are in the shadows because of the waves.
06:56Tsunamis, several miles in height, crash down on the ground.
07:01Millions of tons of magma collide with the ocean.
07:05Billions of gallons of water just evaporate.
07:08Moisture rises into the air, mixes with ash,
07:11and floods the land in the form of giant cumulus clouds.
07:15You've accepted the complete destruction of the planet.
07:19But something strange happens to the Moon at this moment.
07:22You notice giant cracks appear on it.
07:25The Moon slowly begins to divide into two parts.
07:29Both halves crumble into hundreds of large pieces.
07:33It's just falling apart.
07:34The Earth doesn't have a natural satellite anymore.
07:37It's just a pile of giant space rocks.
07:41But why is this happening?
07:43There's a space around our planet called the Roche Limit.
07:47In this place, the gravity of Earth is stronger than that of the Moon.
07:51This means that the forces holding the Moon together are weaker than those that tear it apart.
07:58People are cheering.
07:59The Roche Limit has saved the planet.
08:01The Moon won't hit us.
08:03It breaks up into millions of fragments and forms a circle around our globe.
08:08Now, Earth looks like Saturn.
08:10A belt of moonstones surrounds us.
08:13Huge chunks destroy everything in their path.
08:16All the space debris.
08:17The satellites are no longer working.
08:20Humanity loses its means of communication and navigation.
08:24People will have to use paper maps again.
08:26The Moon held our planet's orbit at a certain angle before these events.
08:30Now the axis is tilted differently.
08:33One hemisphere becomes closer to the Sun, and the other plunges into shadow.
08:38The North Pole and the Arctic may turn into hot deserts, and the equator of the planet may be covered
08:44with ice.
08:45Winter and summer can last for years.
08:47The Moon's remnants fly around Earth, but some of them fall on our planet.
08:52Lunar meteor showers destroy cities and create giant craters.
08:57All these events lead to the massive destruction of life on Earth.
09:00It will take hundreds of thousands of years to adapt to the new world.
09:05Oh, fasten your seatbelts.
09:07We're setting course for the most bizarre places in our universe,
09:10and you'll see the most mysterious phenomena few people have ever seen before.
09:16Recently, astronomers have discovered that the supermassive black hole at the center of our home Milky Way galaxy might be
09:23leaking.
09:24Why is it a significant change?
09:26Because it might mean that this black hole, called Sagittarius A-star, whose mass is 4.1 million times the
09:33mass of our Sun, isn't a sleeping giant as previously thought.
09:37It might still be active, and the leakage, recorded by scientists, may be the whole hiccuping while swallowing clouds of
09:44gas.
09:45Hey, I've been known to do that from time to time.
09:48During the research, the team of astronomers used the Hubble Space Telescope.
09:52It helped them spot a jet that looked like a blowtorch.
09:55It was pushing into clouds of hydrogen at the center of our galaxy.
09:59The jet seemed to spew gas like a hose directed into a pile of sand.
10:03This often occurs around other active black holes surrounded by the material drawn to them by their immense gravitational pull.
10:11Some of this material gets pulled into the black hole, but a small part of it gets swept outward by
10:17powerful magnetic fields.
10:19The research suggests that when a giant gas cloud gets too close to our supermassive black hole, it gets swallowed,
10:25and then the hole belches small jets of matter.
10:28Fermi bubbles might be the result of the belches that occurred around 2 to 4 million years ago.
10:34But recently, scientists have found another giant glowing bubble of hot gas.
10:39It aligned with the jet stretching for 35 light years or more from the supermassive black hole.
10:45Astronomers suspect that the jet could have plowed into this bubble of gas and inflated it.
10:50Now, let's visit some other breathtaking places in our universe.
10:54But be careful.
10:55Some of them are extremely dangerous.
10:57Like this rotating neutron star called the Black Widow Pulsar.
11:02Just like its spider namesake, it's munching on its partner, a lightweight brown dwarf star.
11:07The more material this pulsar consumes, the more slowly it spins.
11:12The energy the neutron star is losing in the process causes the companion star to dwindle.
11:17If it does exist, nuclear pasta is the strongest material in the entire universe.
11:23Formed from the leftovers of extinguished stars.
11:26This substance gets squeezed into spaghetti-like tangles of material.
11:30It can break, but only if you apply 10 billion times the pressure needed to shatter steel.
11:36How about visiting a planet where it rains glass?
11:40Nah, I'd rather not.
11:41You see, this bright blue exoplanet looks peaceful and slightly familiar.
11:46Don't you think it slightly resembles Earth?
11:48But this pretty appearance hides the planet's terrifying nature.
11:52The winds blow at 5,400 miles per hour on its surface.
11:56That's seven times the speed of sound.
11:58But that's not the worst.
12:00It rains glass sideways in this scorching hot alien world.
12:04Solar tsunamis are a solar phenomenon dubbed terminator events.
12:09These tsunamis take place at the sun's equator.
12:12Disastrous magnetic field collisions seem to cause ginormous twin tsunamis of plasma.
12:18These tsunamis tear across the star's surface, moving at a speed of 1,000 feet per second.
12:23They can last for weeks at a time and happen every decade or so.
12:28Now look at this space body.
12:30Its nickname is Electric Hyperion.
12:32This Saturn's moon is one of the most bizarre-looking moons in the solar system.
12:36But its appearance isn't the strangest thing about it.
12:39This pumice-stone-like rock, pockmarked with countless craters,
12:43is also charged with static electricity.
12:45And it's flowing out into space.
12:48Look at this.
12:49A rogue planet with auroras.
12:51Lost in space and drifting through galaxies,
12:54rogue planets were once flung away from their parents' stars.
12:57But one of them, 200 light-years away from Earth, is different from the rest.
13:02It's a planet-sized object with a magnetic field 200 times stronger than that of Jupiter.
13:07This field is so powerful that it generates flashing auroras in the planet's atmosphere.
13:12Be sure to stay away from black holes.
13:15Do I really need to warn you?
13:17Yep, they're some of the most perilous objects in the universe.
13:20But how about many black holes?
13:22Unlike their massive siblings, hypothetical mini-black holes could be really tiny,
13:27not bigger than an atom.
13:29Even so, just one minuscule thing would have the mass of a thousand sedans.
13:34One theory claims that tons of micro-black holes
13:37could have been created right after the Big Bang and the beginning of the universe.
13:41Some scientists even go as far as to say
13:44that a couple of mini-black holes pass through our planet every day.
13:48Ooh, I'll bet you like our next stop, a burning ice planet.
13:53Far-away Neptune-sized exoplanet, Gliese 436 b, is a paradox.
13:59It's made of scorching hot ice.
14:01The planet completes one full orbit around the red dwarf Gliese 436 in just two days.
14:08It means it's traveling remarkably close to its parent star.
14:11That might be the reason the planet's temperatures rarely drop below 800 degrees Fahrenheit.
14:17But the strangest thing?
14:18The planet hosts huge volumes of water ice, known as Ice X,
14:23which remains solid despite blistering temperatures.
14:26Now, if you love jewelry, this next world is for you.
14:30A diamond planet.
14:31About 4,000 light-years away from Earth,
14:34there's a planet that seems to be one enormous diamond.
14:37The planet is denser than any other discovered so far and consists mostly of carbon.
14:43It's so dense that astronomers think this carbon might be crystalline.
14:47This, in turn, might mean that at least some part of the planet is diamond.
14:52Moons orbiting other moons might exist, or they might not.
14:56Astronomers haven't agreed on this one yet.
14:59Planets orbit stars, and moons orbit planets.
15:02But then, why can't there be moon moons, also known as submoons, moonettes, and moons?
15:08It actually sounds like one of those flowery Hawaiian dresses.
15:11You know, moo-moos.
15:12But alas, no.
15:14Researchers claim that moon moons could exist,
15:17but the host moon has to be massive enough,
15:19the moon moon, small enough,
15:21and there must be a wide gulf between these moons and the host planet.
15:25Now, I'll take you to the living fossil galaxy.
15:29DG-Sat-1 is as big as the Milky Way.
15:31But it's nearly invisible because its stars are spread out incredibly thinly.
15:36But what makes the galaxy unique is that it's sitting all alone,
15:41unlike other galaxies of this kind.
15:43Those are usually found in clusters.
15:45It can mean that DG-Sat-1 was formed in a different era,
15:49probably a mere one billion years after the Big Bang.
15:53If it's true, this galaxy is a real living fossil.
15:57Now, you won't be able to see the next space phenomenon,
16:00all because people can't see infrared light.
16:03And the phenomenon I'm talking about is an infrared stream from space.
16:08Neutron stars are ultra-dense, collapsed cores of giant stars.
16:13They usually emit X-rays or radio waves.
16:15But in 2018, astronomers discovered a weird stream of infrared light.
16:20It seemed to be coming from a neutron star 800 light-years away from our planet.
16:25This signal was probably generated by a disk of dust surrounding the star.
16:30But this theory hasn't been proven yet.
16:32Behind the orbit of Neptune lies the mysterious Kuiper Belt,
16:37filled with massive icy objects.
16:39The most curious thing about this space formation, though,
16:42is that scientists fail to explain the pattern of its movement.
16:45The only explanation they have is that Neptune might be hiding from our sight a ginormous planet.
16:52This hypothetical planet has already got the name Planet 9.
16:56And all we have to do is wait until its existence is confirmed.
17:01Or not.
17:01Let's visit our star.
17:04But we need to be careful not to come too close.
17:07Because the sun's atmosphere is hotter than the surface of the star.
17:11While on the surface, the temperature reaches 10,000 degrees Fahrenheit,
17:15the upper atmosphere heats up to millions of degrees.
17:18Scientists suspect that explosive bursts of heat from the sun
17:22may have something to do with this unique phenomenon.
17:25Now, this space object is also worth visiting.
17:27Haumea, a dwarf planet orbiting in the Kuiper Belt,
17:31has a bizarre elongated shape and two moons.
17:34The day on this planet lasts four hours,
17:37making it the fastest spinning big object in our solar system.
17:40But the most mysterious thing about Haumea
17:43is that the planet has a thin 40-mile-wide ring circling it.
17:47Ring-a-ding-ding.
17:51Okay, here you are in the middle of the ocean.
17:54It's endless, but you can't see it.
17:56Because there's a thick fog all around you.
17:59Dense clouds hide the huge but dim sun.
18:02Is it day or night?
18:04You don't know.
18:05There's only a gray haze around you.
18:08You're alone.
18:09Even if you try to swim down,
18:11after several hours,
18:12you still won't be able to see the bottom of the ocean.
18:15And that's a typical water planet for you.
18:18I know, sounded kind of dark.
18:20But it's not that bad.
18:21These water worlds are more interesting than they may seem,
18:25so let's take a look at them.
18:27The ocean planet is a planet that consists,
18:30as you might have guessed,
18:31mainly of water, ice, and maybe some rocks.
18:34Think of the Earth's oceans.
18:36Its horrifying depths,
18:37the Mariana Trench, and all that.
18:39And now, can you guess how much space
18:42all the water on Earth takes up?
18:440.025 percent, exactly.
18:48Now, just try to imagine a world of 40 to 60 percent water.
18:52If you dive in there,
18:54the depth can exceed 60 miles.
18:56Compared to that,
18:57the six-mile depth of our Mariana Trench
19:00sounds like nothing.
19:01And yeah, the pressure there will be enormous.
19:03It can reach up to 20,000 Earth atmospheres.
19:07Very crushing.
19:08Now, it may sound scary,
19:10but it still would be great to find out more about these planets.
19:13Fortunately, according to scientists' calculations,
19:16there may be a lot of such planets in our galaxy alone.
19:20Well, you don't have to go far.
19:22You can find these water guys even in our solar system.
19:25Not planets, of course, but moons.
19:28Jupiter has Ganymede and Callisto,
19:30and Saturn has Titan and Enceladus.
19:33The ocean can reach up to 30 percent of the mass of these moons.
19:36Although it isn't clear whether these oceans are covered
19:39with a thick crust of ice.
19:41But we've discovered quite a few full-fledged ocean planets.
19:45This is because the conditions in which these planets may exist
19:49are very specific.
19:50For example, this planet should be somewhere
19:53six to eight times larger than the Earth.
19:55If it's smaller, it'll have a rocky surface.
19:58But if it's bigger, it'll turn into a gas giant.
20:01At the same time,
20:03it must be in the habitable zone of its star.
20:05A little further, and the planet immediately turns into an icy giant
20:09or a cold super-Earth.
20:11So yeah, these guys are very picky.
20:14We first started exploring these planets back in the 1970s.
20:17However, since then, we've found only a couple of them.
20:21But they're still very interesting.
20:23The first planet is Galise 1214b.
20:26It was the very first ocean planet that we discovered.
20:30Initially, the scientists noticed only a small, dim dot.
20:33This dot turned out to be the red dwarf star Galise 1214.
20:38An unremarkable, completely ordinary star
20:41that's five times smaller than our sun and 300 times dimmer.
20:45Scientists wouldn't worry about it at all.
20:48But back in 2009,
20:50they noticed that this star had one single planet.
20:53And this planet turned out to be quite strange.
20:57This super-Earth was two and a half times bigger than our Earth
21:00and six and a half times heavier.
21:02But at the same time,
21:03it had a very, very small density
21:06and about the same gravity as our planet.
21:08In other words,
21:09there were almost no rocks and metals on it.
21:12But it wasn't a gas giant either.
21:14So there was only one option left.
21:16It was covered in water and ice.
21:19And that's how we discovered the first ocean planet.
21:22Well, actually,
21:23we can only assume that it consists of water.
21:26That's what the mathematical calculations say.
21:28In reality, this planet is quite confusing.
21:31It's difficult to explore.
21:33And so far,
21:34scientists haven't been able to find anything there.
21:37No hydrogen,
21:38no helium,
21:39no water,
21:39nada.
21:40That's because the outer layer of the atmosphere of this planet is very dense.
21:44And it perfectly hides its composition.
21:47But even so,
21:48it's probably a water world.
21:51Galise 1214 b is very close to its star.
21:54It's only 0.014 astronomical units away,
21:58which is less than the distance between the moon and us.
22:01The year there lasts about 36 hours.
22:04And the temperatures,
22:05to put it mildly,
22:06are just wild.
22:08Scientists suggest that the average temperature there
22:10can reach 250 to 535 degrees Fahrenheit.
22:14Woo,
22:15that's hot.
22:16Remember the creepy description from the beginning?
22:18Well,
22:19actually,
22:20spending time on Galise 1214 b
22:22would be a little different.
22:24More like swimming in a steam boiler.
22:27Because of such gigantic temperatures,
22:29the ocean on the surface
22:30will be constantly in a state close to boiling
22:33without actually reaching it.
22:34So,
22:35imagine that you're descending to the surface of this planet,
22:38flying through clouds of steam.
22:41And then,
22:42you suddenly find yourself in the water.
22:44What?
22:44But when did it happen?
22:46Well,
22:47that's because the boundary between steam and water
22:49on Galise 1214 b
22:51will be very blurred.
22:53Of course,
22:54you won't be able to swim to the bottom of this ocean.
22:57But most likely,
22:58this bottom is covered with a very thick layer
23:00of so-called hot ice.
23:02It's like regular ice,
23:04but it doesn't really care about the laws of physics.
23:07So,
23:07it just doesn't melt even at gigantic temperatures.
23:10And the thickness of this ice
23:12can reach as much as 3,000 miles.
23:14So,
23:15that's it for the creepy,
23:17gleasy 1214 b.
23:18And not an Airbnb in sight.
23:21Now,
23:21although we can't 100% guarantee
23:24that it's a water world,
23:25we still have another candidate for this position.
23:28A newly discovered planet called
23:31TOI 1452 b.
23:33This planet,
23:34located in the Dragon constellation,
23:36is almost 100 light-years away from us.
23:39It was discovered using the TESS telescope
23:41by a group of researchers
23:42from the University of Montreal.
23:44This planet also belongs
23:46to the class of Super-Earths.
23:48It's 7 times larger than our planet,
23:50but 48 times heavier.
23:52Again,
23:53all this is at a very low density.
23:56Because of this,
23:57scientists have suggested
23:58that almost the entire planet
24:00consists of a giant ocean.
24:02Here,
24:03we were a little luckier.
24:04This world
24:05won't be just a giant puddle
24:06and some thick ice.
24:07On this planet,
24:09there's probably a rocky surface
24:10deep under the water,
24:12just like in a typical ocean.
24:14Don't get too excited, though.
24:16This ocean will certainly be very different
24:18from what we're used to.
24:20TOI 1452 b also orbits a small red dwarf.
24:24And not even one,
24:25but two at once.
24:27At the same time,
24:28if the previous planet
24:29was close to its sun,
24:30then this one,
24:31on the contrary,
24:32is very, very far away.
24:34It's two and a half times
24:36farther from its stars
24:37than Pluto is from the sun.
24:39And it moves at great speed.
24:41A year there
24:41lasts only 11 days.
24:43But we still don't know
24:45many things about this planet.
24:47We'll probably get
24:48some new information
24:49when scientists observe it
24:50from the James Webb telescope.
24:52Well, that's it.
24:54Wait,
24:54did you expect something else?
24:56All right, all right.
24:57I know the question
24:58that bothers you the most.
24:59Can there be life?
25:01Well, this is a difficult question.
25:03We all know that water means life.
25:06And besides,
25:07these planets are in the habitable zones
25:09of their stars.
25:10So, potentially, yes,
25:12there might be life.
25:13Not some full-fledged civilizations,
25:15of course,
25:16but bacteria, fish,
25:18and some creepy giant monsters.
25:19I mean, you know, why not?
25:21However, this is very unlikely.
25:24Water alone isn't enough to create life,
25:27even though it's very important.
25:28There should also be
25:30some micro-elements
25:31and some minerals.
25:32And, unfortunately,
25:33for most water planets,
25:34the composition will only consist
25:36of water and very thick ice.
25:38There won't be any minerals there.
25:41But don't give up.
25:42There's still some probability.
25:44First of all,
25:45there are meteorites and comets.
25:47They can bring the necessary minerals
25:49to the planet.
25:50The more often they crash into it,
25:52the higher the probability
25:53that they'll bring something like this
25:55into the ocean
25:56and thus create life.
25:58Secondly,
25:59TOI-1452b
26:01actually has these minerals.
26:03Yes,
26:04we don't know how deep
26:05the rocky bottom
26:06is located there.
26:07But if it exists,
26:08then surely
26:09something could have originated there.
26:11Let's hope that new research
26:13with powerful telescopes
26:14will allow us
26:15to find out the truth.
26:17And who knows?
26:18Maybe one day
26:19we'll be able to visit
26:20such a planet ourselves.
26:21So,
26:22so,