Podcaster: Jacinta Delhaize; Dr Daniel Cunnama; Dr. Tshiamiso Makwela
Title: The Cosmic Savannah – Ep. 70: Season 5 in Review
Link : www.thecosmicsavannah.com ; @cosmicsavannah (twitter, facebook & instagram); https://thecosmicsavannah.com/episode-70-season-5-in-review/
Description: The band is back together! In this episode Jacinta, Tshia and Dan sit together in the cupboard once again to catch up and to reflect on Season 5.
Dan discusses his travels to Ethiopia while Tshia regales us with tales of her VIP treatment on her visit to China. Jacinta impresses with her carbon conscious travels to the Garden Route.
During the episode the hosts discuss their favorite episodes from the season as well as some exciting news on what we can expect from the upcoming season 6.
From The Cosmic Savannah team we would just like to thank all of our amazing guests that have appeared on Season 5 for their time and for telling us about the amazing work they all do. The Cosmic Savannah Team also want’s to give a huge thanks to all of the volunteers that make this podcast possible!
Join us for this relaxed and entertaining episode of The Cosmic Savannah.
Bio: Dr Jacinta Delhaize and Dr Daniel Cunnama are astronomers based in Cape Town, South Africa. Jacinta is a Research Fellow at the University of Cape Town. She spends her time using huge radio telescopes to study gas and black holes in distant galaxies.
Daniel is the Science Engagement Astronomer at the South African Astronomical Observatory. He likes to use large supercomputers to create simulations of galaxies. Both Jacinta and Daniel love to promote the incredible astronomy happening across the African continent.
Tshia is a post-doc researcher at the University of Cape Town (UCT). She is part of the IAU (International Astronomy Union’s) Office for Astronomy Education (OAE). She explains to us how her work contributes to the advancement of Astronomy education in South Africa and the rest of the world.
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Transcript:
[00:00:00] Jacinta: Welcome to The Cosmic Savannah with Dr. Jacinta Delhaize
[00:00:08] Tshia: Dr. Tshiamiso Makwela
[00:00:09] Dan: And Dr. Daniel Cunnama, each episode we’ll be giving you a behind the scenes look at world class astronomy and astrophysics happening under African skies.
[00:00:17] Jacinta: Let us introduce you to the people involved, the technology we use, the exciting work we do, and the fascinating discoveries we make.
[00:00:26] Tshia: Sit back and relax as we take you on a safari through the skies.
[00:00:32] Dan: Welcome back.
[00:00:33] Jacinta: Hi everyone.
[00:00:34] Tshia: Hello. Hello. Hello.
[00:00:36] Jacinta: It’s been a while…
[00:00:37] Dan: …since all three of us are in the same room.
[00:00:39] Jacinta: Yes, exactly.
[00:00:40] Dan: Can you believe it? The same country even…
[00:00:42] Tshia: ….at the same time.
[00:00:45] Jacinta: So today we are gonna wrap up season five, even though we’ve had a bit of a break and prepare for season six, tell you where we’ve been in the last month or two months or however long it’s been, and kind of look back on the season. So I guess first of all, Dan, we haven’t had you on The Cosmic Svannah for a long time. Where have you been?
[00:01:06] Dan: Yeah, sorry about that. I’ve been around, I have clocked up a fair number of carbon footprint of anti, anti-credits…
Yeah, I think the last time we, we chatted, or before the last time we chatted, I went to Ethiopia, which was a really, really amazing experience. I was there for the, an IAU symposium on dark skies and astronomical heritage. And there were a lot of amazing talks from across Africa, not just from Ethiopia talking about how we can use and look after our dark skies, promote tourism, look at the culture associated with the dark skies and some of the heritage that exists. How we can collect that information, talk to those people, collect those stories, and then share them and utilize that for economic development, really we want people to be visiting these countries.
Africa’s full of incredible dark skies and incredible culture, a lot of amazing stuff, but of course the conference wasn’t just focused on Africa, although it was located in Ethiopia, but there were talks from around the world and people from around the world visiting. So it was hybrid, so there were also people dialing in, but then, you know, a very large international contingent was there. So that was an incredibly exciting, and you know, I came back from that very enthusiastic and…
[00:02:25] Jacinta: Awesome, what sort of other countries were represented there?
[00:02:28] Dan: There was some incredible talks. There was a group from Iran, which I think that by the time we left, we all decided that the next dark skies and astronomical heritage meeting would be in Iran. There are these incredible old sites, temples or, you know, observatories sitting all through the desert, most of which are kind of forgotten.
But there was one group who have been trying to document them, visit them and, yeah, he, he was telling, you know, taking these incredible photos at solstices and equinoxes and things, and telling his stories about, you know, traveling into some pretty… dodgy places. People thinking he’s coming to steal, you know, their treasures or whatever.
And then also, you know, waiting for the exact sunrise on Solstice, only for it to be cloudy.
[laughs]
[00:03:15] Dan: And then have to come back next year, and he said there’s about 2000 of these things across Iran. So you know, if he’s doing one or two a year, it’s a problem. So, yeah, I mean that was incredible and something which I had never heard of before.
[00:03:29] Jacinta: That’s incredible. Oh, well that’s awesome.
[00:03:32] Tshia: It is. It’s quite great. And I think, did it make you think about any overlaps between the stuff that you’ve already worked on, especially with astronomy and people as well, and indigenous astronomy?
[00:03:44] Dan: Yeah, I think that, you know, that we had a lot of conversations not just in the meeting but you know, around it in the evenings and things.
There’s a huge sort of energy behind. Sharing people’s knowledge of the stars and where we sit in 2024. The people who remember those stories are getting old and dying out. So, and the stories are dying with them. So it’s really one of these things, which is very urgent. I mean, it’s been urgent for a couple of decades.
But it gets increasingly urgent, every day we are losing more. So there are a huge number of people who are enthusiastic about keeping, you know, these stories alive, so you get very enthusiastic at a meeting like this and you wanna just collect it all. That’s obviously hard to do.
It’s many, many full-time jobs. But yeah, setting up some sort of system. The one idea we came up with, and it’s sitting on my to-do list number 127 or something, is actually for the general assembly- which is coming later this year. Set up a website or a portal where people can send a voice notes or a little recording or even some text, on a story they have or their grandmother has or something, and just dump it all there.
You know, we are not gonna be able to process it all right now but we’re astronomers, big data doesn’t scare us and these days, you know with AI even audio doesn’t scare us. So we can get this stuff transcribed and collected and like stored. Anyways, so that was one of my ideas. But again, like I said, it was very exciting and, you know, yeah.
[00:05:19] Jacinta: You came back very inspired and I can see it on your face when you’re talking about it now, the passion, it’s awesome.
[00:05:25] Dan: Yeah, it was very cool.
[00:05:26] Jacinta: Cool. I guess that’s one reason why these in-person conferences are actually still very valuable even though, you know, obviously to keep our carbon footprint down and everything, we try and, and do things on Zoom and whatever, but sometimes you just can’t replace that in-person chatting and meeting and brainstorming and throwing ideas out. Yeah. It’s really, really important and really special.
[00:05:47] Dan: And yeah, the world’s made of people, right? Or like society’s made of people, at least not the world but meeting these people and making friends with them. I came away from that meeting, not just with new colleagues and new ideas, but like new friends and that’s how things get done. ’cause you know it comes with passion.
[00:06:06] Tshia: Yeah, I think during my travels I learned about a theme or theory called “community of practice”. There is something that is quite great about getting into communities of people who are doing the same things as you because then you get re-inspired. If you’re already inspired, you get kind of re-inspired to be collaborating with those people, learning from those people, making those connections, and it’s only when you get into those communities that you, learned more. So I think that’s just one of the things that make these in-person conferences quite.
[00:06:39] Dan: You were also traveling recently though, right?
[00:06:41] Tshia: I was!
[00:06:41] Jacinta: Just put that in there. Where did you go?
[00:06:45] Tshia: I went to China, so yeah it was my first time in Asia. It was such a long, long flight. Two long flights.
[00:06:52] Jacinta: How long?
[00:06:54] Tshia: Very long, too long to count, too long to count. So, but just the experience on its own was great. I flew with Emirates…. I’m not sure if I’m allowed to say that.
[00:07:04] Dan: That’s all right. If they pay us, then they can.
[00:07:08] Tshia: So the, the flight generally going there was really great. Obviously I was just too anxious about instructions, if I’ll actually understand anything at all in China, because of the language, and also anxious about being able to communicate with people at home. Because my mom needs to know if I’m okay.
[00:07:29] Jacinta: Of course. Of course.
[00:07:31] Tshia: So just the traveling day got me very anxious, but once I was in China, everything just went so smoothly, was just, was amazed. It was just, it was great. There was traffic on a Sunday, which was…
[00:07:45] Dan: I don’t know, I feel like December in Cape Town, is similar, it’s like the busiest time of year.
[00:07:51] Tshia: Like what is happening? Where’s everyone going?
[00:07:56] Dan: Kirstenbosch
[00:07:59] Jacinta: Can confirm. Tried to take my myself, peak season! And so why were you in China?
[00:08:05] Tshia: So I was in China for the ‘BRImas’ conference.
[00:08:08] Jacinta: What?
[00:08:08] Tshia: The ‘BRISmas’. So I do not fully remember what the rest of the acronym meant. But the first part is Belt and Road Initiative. So it’s all about science education outside the classroom or rather science education beyond the classroom. So…
[00:08:24] Dan: and it was held over Christmas?
[00:08:26] Tshia: No, it wasn’t held over Christmas.
[00:08:28] Jacinta: But in towards the season? Is that why it had that name?
[00:08:32] Tshia: I don’t know hey, I didn’t ask much because I was just, I mean, before
[00:08:37] Dan: missed opportunity!
[00:08:38] Tshia: I mean, you know, before, before you travel, all you’re thinking about is getting your talk ready , making sure you have your visa. I’m not thinking about Christmas.
[00:08:45] Dan: No. No, nothing. We can institute BRISmas from now on
[00:08:49] Jacinta: “BRISmas”, I like it.
[00:08:52] Dan: We’ll brainstorm something.
[00:08:55] Jacinta: Yeah, we’ll brainstorm. All right. Anyway, sorry. We could totally digress. What was the actual conference about?
[00:08:59] Tshia: Yeah, so it was about science education beyond the classroom.
So the talks were really about how to promote science education, so maths, physics, astronomy, geography, how can we promote that in the classroom, but also outside of the classroom? So China has a lot of museums around, I don’t know how many, but just in Beijing, there’s just like too many to count and they’re big and they’re beautiful and the technology’s amazing.
The Beijing planetarium on its own is. It’s quite mind blowing. They had this exhibit on how Astronomists actually do astronomy. So they had like a whole list of different astronomical objects, the sun, the star galaxy, and then they just had them in different frequencies and wavelengths so that they can actually see what astronomers see when they’re looking through telescopes and getting data.
So they had that for kids. And that is just- that’s just one of the most beautiful things I’ve ever seen. And like just kids can just move along to see the Sun in different, you know, light frequencies, which is quite great.
[00:10:05] Dan: Wow, that is pretty cool.
[00:10:07] Tshia: Yeah, that is pretty cool. So that was one of the coolest things I saw in China, and the next coolest thing was to just like, I will take this memory forever, was visiting the, the China..
[00:10:21] Dan: Great wall?
[00:10:22] Tshia: Well, the Great Wall is great!
[00:10:24] Dan: Great. I mean, it’s.
[00:10:27] Tshia: But I didn’t get the experience that people get of walking up the Great Wall because you know, I was like a VIP. So they took us…
[00:10:34] Jacinta: oh, oh, I’m sorry.
[00:10:35] Dan: Must’ve been nice.
[00:10:35] Tshia: So they took us up the train.
[00:10:37] Dan: Did you flew over it or what?
[00:10:38] Tshia: Literally we did.
[00:10:39] Dan: Oh God from space? Could you see it from space? Where were you? Space Station?
[00:10:45] Tshia: You could see it over, over a small flower could just like see the Great Wall like that. But actually we also took like a small train- okay, like not, it was not a small train, but they have like a cable car going up. So we took like a cable car going up for like five minutes, but it was really cold and I was miserable for most of it.
[00:11:03] Jacinta: All right. So the Great Wall wasn’t impressive enough for Tshiamiso
[00:11:08] Tshia: it’s just too overwhelming to try and walk around that ,minus six degrees.
[00:11:12] Jacinta: Fair enough. Minus? Fair. That is cold, that is cold. Especially for people from South Africa.
[00:11:17] Dan: Exactly. It takes a bit of the charm away.
Yeah.
[00:11:20] Tshia: But then the ancient observatory in China was my greatest visit actually. Right, so, so we went there and that’s where they’re documenting their whole history of astronomy in China, which is, which, quite similar to thousands of years, right? Thousands of years. And like instruments created 200 years ago by different emperors and just how everything comes together, world wars, how they won, how they get their things back. All documented there, and that was just amazing.
[00:11:51] Dan: Sure very cool. That’s awesome, man. I’ve always wanted to go to China it’s on the list.
[00:11:57] Tshia: Please do go. It’s, it’s worth experience.
[00:12:00] Jacinta: What sort of items were there?
[00:12:02] Tshia: So they had different objects that they actually used to do astronomy. So things like…
[00:12:09] Dan: like sextants and Astro Labs and
[00:12:11] Tshia: like Astro labs, yeah so they, they had the manmade tools that they did about 200 years ago, and apparently these things were then, obviously they were invaded and they were, they went all the way to Germany and France and then they only came back after World War 2 or 1, probably World War 2 then they came back and now they’re there locked up and they open for us VIPs!
[00:12:37] Jacinta: Wow!
[00:12:38] Dan: Rub it in eh?
[00:12:41] Jacinta: Did you get to touch them?
[00:12:42] Tshia: Yes. I’ve got to touch them. I’ll show you pictures.
[00:12:45] Jacinta: Oh yeah. Oh yeah. We can put, we post some on the blog. That’s exciting!
[00:12:49] Dan: Cool and Jacinta, you were just telling us before we went online that you went to the mall?
[00:12:54] Jacinta: Thank you Daniel! Well , I have been cautious of my carbon footprint. I’ll judge everybody else in this moment. No, thankfully I’ve not been traveling for a nice break, so I’ve stayed in South Africa and for Christmas, my mom and my aunt came to visit me. Um, hi mom! And that was really awesome and my aunt hadn’t left Australia in quite a few years.
Never been to Africa and so this was a big experience for her. She absolutely loved it. We got to go all over the place and went up the garden route. So for those who aren’t familiar with South Africa, you go from Cape Town and you drive up towards the Eastern Cape and it’s all this like beautiful kind of rainforest area.
It’s stunning, beautiful beaches and we went up to the Addo Elephant park. You know, it’s a natural reserve for animals with lots and lots of elephants. And elephants are my mom’s favorite animal. She has, I think like I don’t know, a hundred statues of elephants in her house and she’s never seen them in the wild.
[00:14:03] Tshia: Wow.
[00:14:03] Jacinta: And so this was a really awesome experience. So yeah, really, really liked that. So lots of babies and the lots of big ones and yeah, it was very exciting and. Gave them a little tour around, around Cape Town, so you know all the hits. The Kirstenbosch Botanical Gardens and Table Mountain and yeah, we didn’t hike.
We did take the cable car
[00:14:27] Dan: VIPs.
[00:14:29] Jacinta: No, but it was, that was definitely a lot of fun. And yeah, and then it was my birthday yesterday actually, so…
[00:14:35] Tshia & Dan: happy birthday!
[00:14:36] Jacinta: Thank you! And I did go to the mall, yeah. But I bought myself some fancy perfume, so that was my present to myself.
[00:14:42] Dan: You smell amazing which is just as well, ’cause it’s tight
[00:14:44] Jacinta: and it is a very small room.
[00:14:48] Dan: But there’d be other things going on in Cape Town too. There was the, the NASSP conference, which you were very active in.
[00:14:53] Jacinta: Yes. So there was the 20th anniversary of the National Astronomy and Space Science Program. So I guess about 20 years ago, the SALT telescope was being constructed in South Africa and this is you know, the biggest optical telescope in the southern hemisphere.
And so the idea was to build human capacity development in South Africa so that South Africans can use this telescope, not just international people coming in and using it. So they wanted to develop astronomy education in South Africa for South Africans and for other African nations. And so they started this NASSP program, as I said, the National Astronomy and Space Science Program, which is essentially helping sort of undergrads in various universities around South Africa get through astronomy degrees to do their honors and to do their masters and funding those things. And there’s been something like 400 and something graduates in astronomy honors since then, which is enormous.
A hundred and something Masters graduates, many PhDs and this was sort of, as the 20th anniversary and it wasn’t only to build up capacity for SALT but also for MeerKAT, which now exists. So it was reinvigorated because of, of MeerKAT and ultimately the SKA, and so of course investment in astronomy in South Africa is a really big deal and it was really awesome in this 20th anniversary to see alumni come back from up to 20 years ago and tell their stories about where they are now and there was people from all over the place.
So some people from other African countries had gone back there and basically launched astronomy education in their country and you know, set up department in their universities and degrees and things like this and basically on their own, which is unbelievable, incredible.
Yeah, I don’t even have words for that. That was amazing. So I got to have a couple of interviews with those people, which was great, and we’re gonna play some of those in season six. And then some people kind of sort of left astronomy, but used those skills transferable in a whole bunch of different fields, most notably in like investment banking, like ethical investment banking, and like , conservation, health yeah. Uh, some- one of them is in Antarctica. Like a whole range of different things. So we got to chat with some of those people and yeah, as I said, those will be coming up in season six.
[00:17:06] Dan: Were you a NASSP graduate, Tshia??
[00:17:08] Tshia: No I wasn’t. Actually I came from WITS, so I just came after my masters at UCT. Right, but I’ve been then involved in NASSP in so many ways, um, that I think I, I’m a “NASSPy” as well.
[00:17:22] Dan: Because you, because you’ve been a lecturer, right? I’m a NASSPy, but yeah…
[00:17:26] Jacinta: Dan himself, you’re a NASSPy?
[00:17:28] Dan: I’m a NASSPy. It was like, I think the third year or fourth year that it had ran.
[00:17:34] Jacinta: Oh, really? All the way in the beginning.
[00:17:36] Dan: Yeah 2006, I think it started in 2004. Wow, yeah early days, long time ago.
[00:17:43] Tshia: Thank you for sharing your age, Dan.
[00:17:47] Dan: I’m slightly older than Jacinta.
[00:17:50] Jacinta: That’s all that matters.
[00:17:53] Tshia: But I think it, it’s also great to see how NASSP has changed the landscape of South African astronomy going forward and even now and I think it’s, it’s really done incredible work.
[00:18:03] Dan: Yeah I think that NASSP can be traced back to, I mean, not just South Africa but the continent. Going to that conference and seeing all the alumni and everyone, the impact has taken South Africa from, you know, 40 PhD astronomers to probably 400 now in 20 years.
[00:18:19] Jacinta: Yeah. It’s crazy. It’s changed so much. It’s really awesome.
[00:18:22] Dan: And it was really good, like you said, just to take a moment to look at that. And yeah, you know, we still have struggles and people, you know, there’s not enough funding and people are struggling with everything. But to see where we came from and just take a moment to appreciate the investment the government’s made and the success of the community has been incredible.
[00:18:40] Jacinta: Absolutely yeah. So speaking of looking back, let’s think back about season five and the episodes that we’ve done so far, and kind of what our favorite episodes were. Any thoughts?
[00:18:50] Dan: I mean, we did two on pulsars and the reason that’s in the front of my mind is, is actually a pulsar workshop happening right now at the SAAO. So I was just down there this morning, peeking my eyes and like, you know we had that excellent conversation with Matthew Bales who, you know, won the Shore Prize and we were talking about the background gravitational hum, which these Pulsar Timing arrays can now detect and there was a sort of first detection of that last year.
And at the time, I think Matthew even said it, that, you know, this is old data. This is, this is, this is stuff from five years ago, which we’ve processed and, and yeah poking my head in there this morning. Like, there’s some exciting stuff.
[00:19:30] Jacinta: Yeah we’re not allowed to say it out loud yet.
[00:19:33] Dan: But yeah, the Pulsar Timing stuff is very exciting.So if you haven’t had a listen to that episode, go back and give it a listen.
[00:19:41] Jacinta: Yeah, that’s episode 66 “Meertime Mysteries- Pulsars and Prizes”.
[00:19:45] Dan: Thank you, Jacinta.
[00:19:46] Jacinta: You’re welcome. Thank you to, to our podcast manager, Francois Campher, who has put together this nice compilation list for us so that we stay on track.
[00:19:56] Dan: So, yeah, so I can’t promise that’ll be coming up in this season, but hopefully maybe it will.
[00:20:00] Jacinta: Yeah, and of course, my favorite episode, which…
[00:20:03] Tshia: Jocelyn?
[00:20:04] Jacinta: Yes. That’s easy to guess. Was that- uh, speaking of pulsars, I also got to speak with Jocelyn Bell-Burnel, who discovered pulsars in the 1960s as part of her PhD and that was just so awesome to be able to, to chat with her and yeah. What about you, Tshia?
[00:20:24] Tshia: I think Jocelyn definitely was quite an incredible interview. Just how humble she is as well in, in talking about these things and never winning the Nobel Prize, but winning everything else in the edit. I think that’s just quite encouraging.
[00:20:41] Jacinta: Yeah and donating a whole bunch of her prize money for, to support women in physics and astronomy is amazing.
[00:20:46] Tshia: Just back into developing astronomy yeah. But my most favorite one was the recent one that we did with Nathan the polar ring galaxies. I had really enjoyed that because I also went to the VR to actually see it. Oh, you were not there, Dan, you missed out.
[00:21:05] Jacinta: I think you were in Ethiopia. I don’t know where he was at the time.
[00:21:08] Dan: It was this- was this in the visualization lab?
[00:21:10] Tshia: Yes yeah, so I think that was quite incredible. Just, you know. So many times we just speak about the galaxies. We describe what they are, we describe the temperatures, we describe everything else, and just getting the description from Nathan and going into the VIS lab and to see what he described and what he was talking about. I quite enjoyed relating the theory and practice together.
[00:21:32] Jacinta: That was episode 68, “Untangling the Origins of Polar Ring Galaxies” and episode 69 “Into the Matrix- Visualizing Polar Ring Galaxies”. So that was speaking with Dr. Nathan Deg, Dr. Lucia Marchetti and Dr. Alex Sivitilli yeah, that was awesome to say.
[00:21:50] Tshia: And I also really enjoyed hearing about the SKA commencement ceremonies, both in Australia and in South Africa, which Dan and Jacinta both attended very cool.
[00:22:01] Dan: I mean, that was, that was like not just an episode highlight. That was a highlight, highlight, yeah from the last couple of years.
[00:22:08] Jacinta: So you’re sitting here like, I’m really un unhappy get to go.
[00:22:13] Dan: I, I also have, I don’t know if I’m allowed to say these sorts of things. Well, oh well, um, what are they gonna do?
[00:22:20] Jacinta: Fire us from our free podcast?
[00:22:27] Dan: Um, uh, so, you know, SKA news, uh, which is also, I guess under wraps, but it’ll probably come out soon, is the first dish is, is in country.
[00:22:37] Tshia: Whoa. Oh. But I remember they were saying something like, it’s getting delivered as we are talking right now and I think I was in some-
[00:22:44] Dan: it was sitting in the, it was sitting in the harbor basically waiting. Got unloaded at like 3:00 AM or something. So, yes, and then it’s, I think it’s, it’s either been trucked or is getting trucked up to the site.
[00:22:57] Jacinta: Cool, so hopefully by the time this episode comes out. We’re allowed to say that okay. So it’s unofficial information. Get, get your information from reliable sources in the future.
[00:23:08] Dan: If you, if you want the podcast to continue, please don’t sail down down the river.
[00:23:14] Jacinta: You know that the SKA people listen to this, right?
[00:23:18] Dan: Oh, we should also add yes, in our credits.The SKA people also support us.
[00:23:23] Jacinta: Yes. So thank you very much to the SKAO, the SKA observatory who have given us a, a nice amount of funding, so that to support us for, for the next year, season six.
[00:23:33] Dan: Yes. Thank you. Thank you very much SKAO, and thank you for, uh, giving us hot tidbits of of news.
[00:23:39] Jacinta: Yeah. And not firing us from the jobs that we don’t have. Okay. Anyway, but yeah, no, the SKA construction commencement ceremonies were awesome. Of course, Dan got to go to the one in South Africa. That was episode 61, and then I went to the one in Australia. I think that was episode 62, or maybe it was part one, part two.
I can’t remember. But you’ll, you’ll have a look at that. Those are the SKA commencement construction commencement ceremonies. And of course, because I love Galaxy Evolution, I, I liked episode 63 “How Galaxies Evolve” with Dr. Sthabile Kolwa. That was really cool. Like hearing all about the, what she called the, the, the Baryon cycle, I think of like where matter is in galaxies and like how it cycles through and how it changes. Uh, I thought that was really exciting.
[00:24:21] Tshia: You’re really in your element in that interview.
[00:24:24] Jacinta: Yeah. I didn’t wanna end, it was good.
[00:24:27] Dan: I also really enjoyed the this Universe episode with Alexander Anderson and I also wanted to bring it up because, you know, at the time we said it, when we were talking to Alexander, that project was sort of coming to an end.
What, what you could work on in terms of the bursts from space. But new data was- kept coming out and I saw there was a release just the other day of more data. On a separate project. So, you know, if you are interested in citizen science and if you want to get involved, there is so much to do.
Yeah this universe is a great resource if you visit that because you know, there are various projects, not just related to MeerKAT, but around the world. Uh, but it’s an excellent resource.
[00:25:04] Jacinta: Yeah. So you can just go online. You don’t need any training as an astronomer, nothing, no classes, and it will teach you all what you need to know and then you can get to classify objects in space, transient, I think things that just go, they just randomly explode.
[00:25:17] Dan: So instead of doom scrolling on Instagram yeah, doom scrolling on galaxies!
[00:25:22] Jacinta: Yeah and then do some good. Yeah, it’s episode 64 Bursts form Space. Yeah, I think we should do that.
[00:25:27] Dan: What? Like have a Instagram universe and people can just doom scroll.
Well, it’s an idea, these ideas.
[00:25:35] Jacinta: It just was a fresh one sure, we’ll put that on the maybe pile. Okay. Well actually Tshiamiso what I was gonna say is like the highlight for me of this entire season was getting you as a host!
[00:25:50] Dan: She didn’t see it coming at all, yay! I can’t clap.
[00:25:53] Jacinta: She looks conf-.
[00:25:54] Dan: No, no, no clapping.
[00:25:55] Jacinta: You’ll look very confused there but yes, of course we have a whole new host Tshiamiso Makwela ladies and gentlemen!
[00:26:00] Dan: Thank you very much!
[00:26:01] Tshia: I feel so pale!
[00:26:01] Dan: Clap, clap, clap, clap, clap, clap, clap.
[00:26:05] Tshia: Thank you very much for having me.
[00:26:07] Dan: We’ve got our very own VIP!
[00:26:09] Jacinta: Yeah apparently, flown over the wall of Great Wall of China and unimpressed
[00:26:13] Tshia: while I was in China I was just like, South Africa doesn’t deserve me!
[00:26:19] Dan: There we go.
[00:26:22] Jacinta: Well, thank you for your presence. Thank you for! Returning. Um, and of course we have now a podcast manager, Francois Campher and without him we would not have a podcast because we are all just like, I think our careers have changed over time since, since we’ve started the podcast nearly five years ago, and we wouldn’t be able to continue it without some guidance and sanity from Francois.
So thank you so much Francois! For all of your hard work and of course we heard from both Francois and Tshiamiso on episode 67, ” A Stroll to the Edge of The Universe”
[00:26:54] Dan: Thank you, Francois, thank you.
[00:26:55] Tshia: Thank you, Francois.
[00:26:56] Dan: Big thank you to Francois.
[00:26:57] Jacinta: Yeah yeah and that brings us, I think to the end of episode 70 and the end of season five. Thank you both my wonderful co-host.
[00:27:06] Tshia: Oh, thank you thank you, Jacinta. Thank you, Dan, for actually inviting me to be part of this. I’ve learned a lot and I’ve enjoyed myself.
[00:27:14] Jacinta: And, and you’ve done a fantastic job. You really have.
[00:27:17] Tshia: I’m just trying.
[00:27:19] Dan: And we will be back soon with season six.
[00:27:21] Jacinta: Yes. So yes, now that we have a manager who will make us start season six, yes. We’re hoping to start that soon. We won’t, won’t make any promises because we’re not very good at keeping them on time. But yeah, we do have a lot of exciting interviews that we’ve already done, so episodes that we’ve already prepared and yeah, we are not going to give too many spoilers, but there’s some big ones coming and of course this year is going to be.
A massive in preparation for the IAU General Assembly, the International Astronomical Unions General Assembly, which is basically like the Olympics of astronomy held right here in Cape Town, first time in Africa. So Dan is one of the main organizers for that and you can see him sweating as we speak.
And stressing out so that’s not just the heat. All right, so we better, we better go. But um, thank you all once again for listening. You are the reason why we do this, and we hope that you enjoy it. We value your feedback and yeah, keep that coming. And, and I hope you join us for the next season of The Cosmic Savannah.
[00:28:18] Tshia: You can visit our website, the thecosmicsavannah.com. We will have the transcript, links, pictures and other stuff related to today’s episode.
[00:28:25] Dan: You can follow us on X, Facebook and Instagram @cosmicsavannah. That’s “Savannah” spelled S-A-V-A-N-N-A-H. You can also find us on YouTube where audio only episodes are uploaded with closed captions, which can be auto translated into many different languages, including Afrikaan and Zulu.
[00:28:41] Jacinta: Thanks to all our volunteers on this season of The Cosmic Savannah, including our new podcast manager, Francois Campher, our social media manager, Sumari Hattingh, and our audio editor Jacob Fine.
[00:28:53] Tshia: Also, Mark Wahlnut for Music production Miha Warchek for photography, Carl Jones for Astrophotography. Suzy Caras for graphic design and thanks to Emil Meintjies for video creation, Moses Makungu and Abigail Tambiran for transcription.
[00:29:06] Dan: We gratefully acknowledged support from the South African National Research Foundation, the South African Agency for Science and Technology Advancement, the South African Astronomical Observatory and the University of Cape Town astronomy department, and our new sponsor; the Square Kilometer Array Observatory.
[00:29:21] Jacinta: You can subscribe on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, or wherever you get your podcasts and would really appreciate it if you could rate and review us and recommend us to a friend.
[00:29:30] Tshia: We’ll speak to you next time on The Cosmic Savannah.
End of podcast:
365 Days of Astronomy
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The 365 Days of Astronomy Podcast is produced by Planetary Science Institute. Audio post production by me, Richard Drumm, project management by Avivah Yamani, and hosting donated by libsyn.com. This content is released under a creative commons Attribution-NonCommercial 4.0 International license. Please share what you love but don’t sell what’s free.
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As we wrap up today’s episode, we are looking forward to unravel more stories from the Universe. With every new discovery from ground-based and space-based observatories, and each milestone in space exploration, we come closer to understanding the cosmos and our place within it.
Until next time let the stars guide your curiosity!