1 00:00:00,000 --> 00:00:03,870 Hello, I'm Alex Honnold, professional rock climber, and today 2 00:00:03,870 --> 00:00:07,307 I get the pleasure of chatting with Ivona, an oceanographer and a scientist 3 00:00:07,307 --> 00:00:11,044 who can help me understand NASA's PACE mission and what it does for 4 00:00:11,044 --> 00:00:13,713 the health of the oceans and what that means for us. 5 00:00:13,713 --> 00:00:16,449 Ivona, thanks for a chatting with me today. 6 00:00:16,449 --> 00:00:18,385 So, so happy to be here. 7 00:00:18,385 --> 00:00:21,287 I'm very honored myself too. 8 00:00:21,287 --> 00:00:23,990 You may not know, but actually the last two big expeditions 9 00:00:23,990 --> 00:00:27,560 that I've done were for television programs, and they both involved 10 00:00:27,560 --> 00:00:32,165 ocean health and and one of them, we've launched a NASA probe for OMG, 11 00:00:32,165 --> 00:00:35,702 the Oceans Melting Greenland project. -Oh, awesome. 12 00:00:35,702 --> 00:00:37,370 So I feel like I’m 13 00:00:37,370 --> 00:00:42,175 I've been sort of into NASA ocean health projects already, but so it's it's 14 00:00:42,175 --> 00:00:45,979 nice to be able to talk to you today and learn more about the current project. 15 00:00:46,112 --> 00:00:49,315 So, yeah, well, I mean, like, you were working part part of the 16 00:00:49,349 --> 00:00:53,286 you know, this part of NASA that is looking at ice, but NASA is really, 17 00:00:53,286 --> 00:00:56,289 you know, looking at all different systems of the Earth. 18 00:00:56,489 --> 00:00:59,325 And we have ice, we have land, we have atmosphere, we have ocean. 19 00:00:59,325 --> 00:01:02,562 And I'm kind of like, you know, really focused on oceanography 20 00:01:02,562 --> 00:01:06,132 and trying to understand how different processes in the ocean are impacting, 21 00:01:06,132 --> 00:01:08,568 you know, our livelihood, but also the whole, you know, 22 00:01:08,568 --> 00:01:10,603 climate system of the Earth. 23 00:01:10,603 --> 00:01:12,372 But I think maybe the bigger question is 24 00:01:12,372 --> 00:01:16,309 how often does NASA look back at Earth as opposed to at space? 25 00:01:16,309 --> 00:01:19,179 I mean, I think that most of us think of NASA as, 26 00:01:19,179 --> 00:01:23,116 you know, going to the Moon, going to Mars, going into deep space or something. 27 00:01:23,116 --> 00:01:26,019 But how much of NASA's work is focused on the Earth? 28 00:01:26,886 --> 00:01:29,189 So that's a really good point, because when, you know, people 29 00:01:29,189 --> 00:01:32,425 ask me what I do, I say like, I'm an oceanographer and I work at NASA. 30 00:01:32,425 --> 00:01:33,026 They're like, hmm? 31 00:01:33,026 --> 00:01:33,293 You know, 32 00:01:33,293 --> 00:01:36,596 big question mark on top of their head because not that many people know 33 00:01:36,596 --> 00:01:40,266 that really like a big portion of NASA's mission is looking back at the Earth, 34 00:01:40,300 --> 00:01:43,903 you know, having that vantage point of space and turning these instruments 35 00:01:43,970 --> 00:01:47,207 back towards our home allows us to observe the Earth 36 00:01:47,207 --> 00:01:50,510 in a way that we can't do it from sitting down here. 37 00:01:50,510 --> 00:01:54,114 So big portion of NASA, I think we have like 20 different satellites 38 00:01:54,347 --> 00:01:56,983 are looking back at the Earth, at different aspects of Earth. 39 00:01:56,983 --> 00:01:59,786 So talk about this current mission, the PACE mission. 40 00:01:59,786 --> 00:02:02,222 What differentiates that from the other NASA 41 00:02:02,222 --> 00:02:04,390 missions that are also looking at the Earth? 42 00:02:04,390 --> 00:02:05,859 So PACE mission, 43 00:02:05,859 --> 00:02:08,862 you know, It's my baby, So I love it and I think is the best one ever. 44 00:02:08,995 --> 00:02:12,365 But PACE is I mean, like, you know, like your love your children the best. 45 00:02:12,365 --> 00:02:15,368 They are better than everybody else, however weird they are. 46 00:02:15,401 --> 00:02:19,572 But PACE stands for Plankton, Aerosol, Cloud, ocean Ecosystem 47 00:02:19,572 --> 00:02:21,941 And it's a really one of a kind mission that’s 48 00:02:21,941 --> 00:02:25,044 going to be looking at a global ocean color and atmosphere. 49 00:02:25,044 --> 00:02:25,945 as well. 50 00:02:25,945 --> 00:02:30,383 What makes it so special is that for difference that other global 51 00:02:30,383 --> 00:02:34,721 missions, it's going to be able to see so many different colors of the rainbow. 52 00:02:34,821 --> 00:02:37,690 So imagine, you know, like you have a supersonic camera 53 00:02:37,690 --> 00:02:40,393 sitting on a satellite looking down at the ocean. 54 00:02:40,393 --> 00:02:44,464 And before this one, we just had that like, you know, Nokia flip phone cameras. 55 00:02:44,531 --> 00:02:48,268 So the amount of information that we're going to be getting is so much larger 56 00:02:48,268 --> 00:02:53,373 than we had before and higher quality information--sorry. 57 00:02:53,473 --> 00:02:54,240 Go ahead. 58 00:02:54,240 --> 00:02:55,909 What is that, what does that information tell you? 59 00:02:55,909 --> 00:03:00,880 So why does the color of the ocean tell us anything about the health of the ocean? 60 00:03:00,980 --> 00:03:01,981 Yeah, great question. 61 00:03:01,981 --> 00:03:05,151 So so, you know, like, yeah, everybody thinks ocean’s blue. 62 00:03:05,151 --> 00:03:05,852 Ocean is not blue. 63 00:03:05,852 --> 00:03:10,390 Ocean comes in many different colors and what changes the color of the ocean-- 64 00:03:10,390 --> 00:03:14,160 I'm like, I don't know where you from originally. 65 00:03:14,227 --> 00:03:14,827 California. 66 00:03:14,827 --> 00:03:17,864 Okay, well, you have kind of bluish color of the ocean, but, you know, like, 67 00:03:17,864 --> 00:03:21,100 if you go in and like in the San Francisco Bay and stuff, 68 00:03:21,100 --> 00:03:22,769 that ocean is not really any more blue. 69 00:03:22,769 --> 00:03:25,038 It's kind of like greenish and brownish and stuff. 70 00:03:25,038 --> 00:03:28,942 And the color of the ocean changes based on the things that are in the ocean. 71 00:03:29,008 --> 00:03:32,378 And we go in the field, we measure the color of the ocean, 72 00:03:32,378 --> 00:03:33,947 we measure the things that are in the ocean. 73 00:03:33,947 --> 00:03:37,650 We try to build these mathematical ways to translate the color 74 00:03:37,717 --> 00:03:39,285 into what is in the ocean. 75 00:03:39,285 --> 00:03:42,021 And, you know, we can have sediment, we can have dirt, 76 00:03:42,021 --> 00:03:45,992 we can have dissolved organic material, which is kind of like, you know, leaf tea. 77 00:03:45,992 --> 00:03:48,528 But ultimately, and most importantly, 78 00:03:48,528 --> 00:03:51,864 We can have this teeny tiny plankton that lives in there. 79 00:03:51,864 --> 00:03:53,666 These are like, you know, plants or animals 80 00:03:53,666 --> 00:03:56,636 that support the life in the ocean. 81 00:03:56,636 --> 00:03:58,204 So that's kind of what I study. 82 00:03:58,204 --> 00:04:00,073 So just by looking at the color, 83 00:04:00,073 --> 00:04:02,976 I can tell you how many of them there is in there. 84 00:04:02,976 --> 00:04:03,476 So yeah. 85 00:04:03,476 --> 00:04:09,449 That tells us a lot, a lot about, you know, how ocean is, how healthy is the ocean. 86 00:04:09,449 --> 00:04:10,717 And it's kind of 87 00:04:10,717 --> 00:04:13,820 amazing when you think about it that a satellite in space 88 00:04:13,820 --> 00:04:18,057 with a very fancy camera can look at the ocean and tell how many living things 89 00:04:18,057 --> 00:04:18,858 are inside the ocean. 90 00:04:18,858 --> 00:04:21,227 I mean normally you would think that 91 00:04:21,227 --> 00:04:24,297 to determine the number of plankton or phytoplankton in the ocean, 92 00:04:24,297 --> 00:04:27,867 you have to sample the water itself and sort of count the living things. 93 00:04:27,867 --> 00:04:30,937 I mean, isn't it--like is this new technology? 94 00:04:30,937 --> 00:04:34,140 Or is this you like I mean, this seems this seems kind of mind-blowing to me 95 00:04:34,140 --> 00:04:37,210 that you can count the number of living things in the ocean from space. -It is. 96 00:04:37,210 --> 00:04:39,145 It is because you have something that is so 97 00:04:39,145 --> 00:04:41,047 teeny tiny that you can't see with your eyes. 98 00:04:41,047 --> 00:04:42,215 And we usually yes, 99 00:04:42,215 --> 00:04:44,751 we usually take samples of water, look at them under the microscope. 100 00:04:44,751 --> 00:04:49,622 But if you think: they're plants, no, and every plant kind of has green stuff, 101 00:04:49,622 --> 00:04:52,625 the same as plants in the land, these guys have this pigment 102 00:04:52,625 --> 00:04:55,161 that allows them to actually make that and capture 103 00:04:55,161 --> 00:04:59,165 the energy and capture the carbon and feed the rest of the ocean --using chlorophyll? 104 00:04:59,165 --> 00:04:59,666 chlorophyll?--so we can see this. 105 00:04:59,666 --> 00:05:03,102 Yeah. Chlorophyl. Exactly. Yay. Awesome. 106 00:05:03,202 --> 00:05:05,972 So we can see this chlorophyl from space the same way as we can see 107 00:05:05,972 --> 00:05:08,808 the plants in the land. We can see this chlorophyl from space. 108 00:05:08,808 --> 00:05:12,679 The more green there is, the more phytoplankton there is in the ocean. 109 00:05:12,679 --> 00:05:14,681 So this technology is really not that new. 110 00:05:14,681 --> 00:05:18,584 We have we've been observing ocean for over 20 years now 111 00:05:18,618 --> 00:05:22,255 just by looking at a certain set of colors so we can see the green, 112 00:05:22,322 --> 00:05:24,657 we can see a couple of blues, we can see a couple of reds. 113 00:05:24,657 --> 00:05:26,726 And from there we can say, 114 00:05:26,793 --> 00:05:29,762 there is this much phytoplankton in the ocean. 115 00:05:29,762 --> 00:05:33,333 But what PACE is bringing along is that it’s going to be able 116 00:05:33,333 --> 00:05:35,168 to see so many different colors. 117 00:05:35,168 --> 00:05:37,136 So roll back into your backyard. 118 00:05:37,136 --> 00:05:40,440 We have different plants, different roses or whatever. 119 00:05:40,440 --> 00:05:43,676 You have lots of different plants that have different colors, no? 120 00:05:43,743 --> 00:05:46,479 I live in the desert, so there are several species of plant, 121 00:05:46,479 --> 00:05:47,680 but there aren’t that many species of plant. 122 00:05:47,680 --> 00:05:50,850 Just imagine that like, you know, anza-borrego after the rain, 123 00:05:50,850 --> 00:05:54,921 that beautiful bloom of everything, 124 00:05:54,987 --> 00:05:58,658 and in the ocean, you have it's very similar situations 125 00:05:58,658 --> 00:06:02,462 where you have a bunch of different phytoplankton has different colors, 126 00:06:02,462 --> 00:06:06,566 and these pigments do not just pretty things, but they really help 127 00:06:06,632 --> 00:06:08,468 for that transfer of energy. 128 00:06:08,468 --> 00:06:11,938 So PACE is going to be able to see all these different colors. 129 00:06:11,938 --> 00:06:16,242 So currently we see green, if we want to talk about, you know, like 130 00:06:16,342 --> 00:06:18,911 how much food is there in the ocean, we can say that now, 131 00:06:18,911 --> 00:06:22,882 but we cannot say what type of food is in the ocean, what type of phytoplankton 132 00:06:22,882 --> 00:06:25,918 is there and how is it impacting, you know, the carbon flow in the ocean. 133 00:06:25,952 --> 00:06:29,155 So many different important questions that we have. Yes. 134 00:06:29,288 --> 00:06:32,692 So how does the amount and type of phytoplankton in the ocean 135 00:06:32,692 --> 00:06:34,427 determine ocean health? 136 00:06:34,427 --> 00:06:35,995 What does that really tell us? 137 00:06:35,995 --> 00:06:38,664 Yeah, knowing that there are lots of tiny little creatures in the sea, 138 00:06:38,664 --> 00:06:40,433 what does that mean? 139 00:06:40,833 --> 00:06:45,405 So, you know, like on one side, phytoplankton 140 00:06:45,505 --> 00:06:47,740 is the the base of marine food web. 141 00:06:47,740 --> 00:06:51,744 Now we want to have a good amount of phytoplankton to support the livelihood 142 00:06:51,744 --> 00:06:53,246 of all these other things. 143 00:06:53,246 --> 00:06:56,516 You know, this like, you know, really cool megafauna 144 00:06:56,516 --> 00:07:00,920 that we care about, you know, dolphins and whales and manatees down in Florida. 145 00:07:00,987 --> 00:07:04,056 So we want to have this this phytoplankton 146 00:07:04,056 --> 00:07:07,160 present there and we want to have diversity of phytoplankton. 147 00:07:07,160 --> 00:07:10,663 We also want to have phytoplankton present there because it gives 148 00:07:10,663 --> 00:07:14,267 a really big ecosystem service to the climate of the ocean. 149 00:07:14,367 --> 00:07:18,704 So phytoplankton captures that carbon and while feeding the rest of the ocean, 150 00:07:18,704 --> 00:07:22,842 actually removes some of the carbon from the atmosphere and controls the climate. 151 00:07:22,942 --> 00:07:26,145 But ultimately, when you think about ocean health-- sorry, go ahead. 152 00:07:26,245 --> 00:07:28,848 Well, actually, that's just a question of 153 00:07:28,848 --> 00:07:32,351 when we talk about the oceans absorbing carbon, because I mean, you know, 154 00:07:32,351 --> 00:07:34,687 I've read statistics about climate change and stuff that oceans absorb 155 00:07:34,687 --> 00:07:37,290 most of what humans have dumped into the atmosphere 156 00:07:37,290 --> 00:07:38,724 over the last hundred years. 157 00:07:38,724 --> 00:07:40,426 Fifty percent, yeah. 158 00:07:40,426 --> 00:07:43,996 So is that through phytoplankton, is that what you're describing? 159 00:07:43,996 --> 00:07:47,767 Like when we talk about oceans absorbing carbon, how much is that through phytoplankton 160 00:07:47,767 --> 00:07:51,671 and through other things eating phytoplankton? 161 00:07:52,104 --> 00:07:52,405 Yeah. 162 00:07:52,405 --> 00:07:55,041 So, so there's, there's two different systems in the ocean. 163 00:07:55,041 --> 00:07:57,877 Majority of this anthropogenic carbon that we are talking about 164 00:07:57,877 --> 00:08:01,347 is actually absorbed through ocean itself, through the water of the ocean, no? 165 00:08:01,581 --> 00:08:04,116 So you just have a physical process of diffusion 166 00:08:04,116 --> 00:08:06,018 And that’s the ocean acidification? --and that takes the anthropogenic. 167 00:08:06,018 --> 00:08:06,686 Yeah. 168 00:08:06,686 --> 00:08:11,824 What phytoplankton does, phytoplankton really likes they like a natural carbon. 169 00:08:11,824 --> 00:08:14,727 Carbon that comes from the natural sources, the carbon that is already there. 170 00:08:14,727 --> 00:08:17,830 But just by doing so, by removing this carbon from the surface 171 00:08:17,830 --> 00:08:21,400 of the ocean, it allows more carbon to enter inside. 172 00:08:21,501 --> 00:08:23,536 So it's not directly eating the anthropogenic 173 00:08:23,536 --> 00:08:26,572 carbon, it's not taking that one, but it's removing the other one 174 00:08:26,772 --> 00:08:29,108 so the anthropogenic carbon can come inside. 175 00:08:29,108 --> 00:08:32,111 But what is more important, so it’s really good, 176 00:08:32,245 --> 00:08:35,414 you know, remove that carbon, puts it into sugars, either dies 177 00:08:35,414 --> 00:08:38,818 and then sinks deep into the ocean and removes that carbon 178 00:08:38,818 --> 00:08:40,486 from that contact with the atmosphere, therefore 179 00:08:40,486 --> 00:08:43,022 leaving that space open for more carbon to come in. 180 00:08:43,022 --> 00:08:47,994 Or it shoves it like, you know, laterally into the fishes and rest of the 181 00:08:48,094 --> 00:08:50,696 and things in the ocean that ultimately poop 182 00:08:50,696 --> 00:08:53,966 and then the poop sinks down and once again you're removing that carbon. 183 00:08:53,966 --> 00:08:58,671 So it's, it's a really interesting process where you have biology 184 00:08:58,671 --> 00:09:03,309 just kind of making space for the physics to pull down that anthropogenic carbon. 185 00:09:03,409 --> 00:09:05,278 that kind of like explaining it? 186 00:09:05,278 --> 00:09:07,446 Yeah, no, totally, totally. -Awesome. 187 00:09:07,446 --> 00:09:12,885 I mean I guess that brings me back to the bigger questions about PACE. 188 00:09:12,885 --> 00:09:16,756 So, so what's the key differentiator like, well, what's what's new? 189 00:09:16,756 --> 00:09:18,558 It's just that the camera is much nicer, 190 00:09:18,558 --> 00:09:20,993 so you get great resolution on what exactly is in the ocean? 191 00:09:20,993 --> 00:09:21,561 Yeah, Yeah. 192 00:09:21,561 --> 00:09:23,095 And that's sort of sounds like, Yeah, well, 193 00:09:23,095 --> 00:09:26,432 you know, like you can go down and like get a better iPhone 194 00:09:26,432 --> 00:09:29,402 and then whatever phone, but it's a big deal for us. 195 00:09:29,402 --> 00:09:30,836 You know, like for, for 20 years 196 00:09:30,836 --> 00:09:33,806 we've been staring at the ocean and seeing in five or six colors 197 00:09:33,806 --> 00:09:37,143 and it couldn't tell you if it's a, if it's an oak forest or is it a meadow. 198 00:09:37,143 --> 00:09:38,611 You know, or is it a desert blooming? 199 00:09:38,611 --> 00:09:41,581 With PACE I'm going to be able to tell you that. 200 00:09:41,581 --> 00:09:43,516 And it's really important because think about yourself. 201 00:09:43,516 --> 00:09:46,052 You can't eat peas all the time, you know, the specific diet, 202 00:09:46,052 --> 00:09:49,255 and you want to know what is there to be offered. So... 203 00:09:49,255 --> 00:09:50,056 That's a good 204 00:09:50,056 --> 00:09:53,292 analogy, differentiating between the desert in bloom versus 205 00:09:53,292 --> 00:09:56,696 a meadow because it’s like fundamentally different ecosystems, completely different. 206 00:09:56,696 --> 00:10:00,399 But you're right, viewed from above, you just be like it’s a bunch of green. Like it all looks the same. 207 00:10:00,399 --> 00:10:01,200 Exactly. 208 00:10:01,200 --> 00:10:05,271 It could be a lawn, could be a meadow, could be a desert after a big rain. 209 00:10:05,271 --> 00:10:07,740 Could be your desert now blooming. 210 00:10:07,740 --> 00:10:11,677 And the ocean does have, you know, jungles and deserts and stuff 211 00:10:11,677 --> 00:10:12,578 we just don't think about. 212 00:10:12,578 --> 00:10:16,148 And we really never thought about it until we had a vision 213 00:10:16,148 --> 00:10:19,385 of of of, of ocean from the, from the space. 214 00:10:19,385 --> 00:10:21,587 That's pretty much the first time where like, you know, 215 00:10:21,587 --> 00:10:22,588 when you look at these animations 216 00:10:22,588 --> 00:10:26,125 that NASA has, you see this like blooms like pulsating, you know. 217 00:10:26,392 --> 00:10:29,261 In North Atlantic along the coast and stuff like that. 218 00:10:29,261 --> 00:10:30,796 And that's the vantage point of space. 219 00:10:30,796 --> 00:10:33,299 This is where we start to understand so much better. 220 00:10:33,299 --> 00:10:34,800 You know, the the the 221 00:10:34,800 --> 00:10:38,404 not just the vastness, but the diversity of the ecosystems and the ocean. 222 00:10:38,471 --> 00:10:40,539 And, you know, and this is just the beginning. 223 00:10:40,539 --> 00:10:42,174 We just see the base of the food chain. 224 00:10:42,174 --> 00:10:45,044 And then you can just imagine everything else that happens 225 00:10:45,044 --> 00:10:48,014 in three dimensions of the ocean in a sense. 226 00:10:49,215 --> 00:10:49,949 It's pretty cool. 227 00:10:49,949 --> 00:10:50,383 Yeah. Yeah. 228 00:10:50,383 --> 00:10:53,386 So what are you most excited about with the PACE mission? 229 00:10:53,386 --> 00:10:55,955 Which aspect of PACE mission gets you fired up? 230 00:10:56,589 --> 00:11:01,427 So, so, you know, there's there's lots of human impact 231 00:11:01,427 --> 00:11:04,397 when it comes to PACE you know, like harmful algal blooms 232 00:11:04,397 --> 00:11:08,734 and all these things, you know, fisheries in coastal area, aquaculture. 233 00:11:08,801 --> 00:11:11,137 I'm an open ocean girl, I'm a carbon girl. 234 00:11:11,137 --> 00:11:15,207 I'm really, really, really interested in understanding 235 00:11:15,207 --> 00:11:17,076 how the diversity of the phytoplankton. 236 00:11:17,076 --> 00:11:20,946 So like, you know, the community that you see in your blooming desert 237 00:11:21,047 --> 00:11:22,448 impacts the flow of carbon. 238 00:11:22,448 --> 00:11:24,183 I'm really working on that whole story 239 00:11:24,183 --> 00:11:27,453 that we spoke about is, you know, where is the carbon going to end up? 240 00:11:27,453 --> 00:11:30,589 Because ultimately the diversity of the phytoplankton 241 00:11:30,589 --> 00:11:33,759 community in the surface will determine the path of that carbon. 242 00:11:33,859 --> 00:11:39,031 And once I understand that, we can work with modelers 243 00:11:39,098 --> 00:11:42,568 and modelers can put that in their bigger system models and 244 00:11:42,735 --> 00:11:46,572 and then give us, you know, like a better opportunity to understand 245 00:11:46,572 --> 00:11:49,709 what's going to be happening down the line not just for the oceans, 246 00:11:49,709 --> 00:11:53,179 but also for the whole Earth system, because everything is interconnected. 247 00:11:53,179 --> 00:11:55,448 So that's where I am. 248 00:11:55,448 --> 00:11:58,050 And I think that's that's something that we talk about, 249 00:11:58,050 --> 00:11:59,952 just getting more data to put in the models. 250 00:11:59,952 --> 00:12:02,955 That's something I sort of realized on our expedition in Greenland. 251 00:12:02,955 --> 00:12:06,625 Where I was describing launching a little NASA probe with the OMG. 252 00:12:06,625 --> 00:12:10,696 You know, it was just like a little little metal cylinder that bobs up and down 253 00:12:10,730 --> 00:12:12,398 and measures temperature and salinity 254 00:12:12,398 --> 00:12:15,968 in the fjord and kind of helps determine how much the ocean is melting 255 00:12:15,968 --> 00:12:18,971 the glaciers or vice versa, how much water is coming from each. 256 00:12:18,971 --> 00:12:22,942 And you know, you're like, it's just one tiny, 257 00:12:22,942 --> 00:12:26,979 tiny little device that just adds data to, 258 00:12:26,979 --> 00:12:28,214 you know, it made me realize 259 00:12:28,214 --> 00:12:31,851 how much modern science is just tons and tons of data. Yep. 260 00:12:31,851 --> 00:12:35,755 Trying to paint a more full image of how the world actually works. 261 00:12:35,755 --> 00:12:38,524 And so when you talk about a mission like PACE, or talk about OMG and like 262 00:12:38,524 --> 00:12:40,726 launching this little temperature and salinity probe, 263 00:12:40,726 --> 00:12:45,197 you're like, it's not as if one instrument is is doing the thing. 264 00:12:45,197 --> 00:12:48,200 It's not like the one instrument is, you know, 265 00:12:48,200 --> 00:12:51,203 making key discoveries by itself necessarily, 266 00:12:51,203 --> 00:12:55,508 but it's helping to determine, I don't know. 267 00:12:55,508 --> 00:12:59,078 It just made me realize that the vastness of science now. 268 00:12:59,745 --> 00:13:04,016 It, it takes a lot of data to sort of understand very complex systems. 269 00:13:04,183 --> 00:13:06,919 Yeah. And you know, I'm a biologist by training. 270 00:13:07,019 --> 00:13:10,122 I started as a biologist, like, you know, doing classical biological 271 00:13:10,122 --> 00:13:10,623 things, you know, 272 00:13:10,623 --> 00:13:12,958 looking at the things in the microscope, looking at the little like, 273 00:13:12,958 --> 00:13:14,894 you know, foxes running into the forest and stuff. 274 00:13:14,894 --> 00:13:18,497 And as I was going up, you know, through my, you know, 275 00:13:18,597 --> 00:13:21,801 my training, I've been turning myself more and more towards data. 276 00:13:21,901 --> 00:13:24,804 You know, I still go in ocean, I still collect samples and still, 277 00:13:24,804 --> 00:13:27,606 you know, throw these little probes similar to the ones that you have, 278 00:13:27,606 --> 00:13:30,643 you know, throw in to see temperature and salinity because again, temperature 279 00:13:30,643 --> 00:13:34,046 salinity defines the ecosystem in which my phytoplankton lives. 280 00:13:34,113 --> 00:13:37,316 There's such a thorough data out there and the more data we get with 281 00:13:37,349 --> 00:13:41,287 that allows us to better focus on the things that we don't understand. 282 00:13:41,387 --> 00:13:44,390 So like, you know, PACE is going to give us like currently--to 283 00:13:44,423 --> 00:13:47,827 step back--currently we know from the current ocean 284 00:13:47,827 --> 00:13:50,830 color satellites that there's a big change happening in the ocean. 285 00:13:51,063 --> 00:13:52,498 There’s certain types of oceans, 286 00:13:52,498 --> 00:13:56,502 the certain portions of the oceans that are getting greener, you know, rapidly. 287 00:13:56,602 --> 00:13:57,469 And we can just say that 288 00:13:57,469 --> 00:14:00,639 they're getting greener because we can’t see different colors. 289 00:14:00,639 --> 00:14:03,809 But with PACE we're going to be able to look at those portions 290 00:14:03,809 --> 00:14:07,079 of the ocean and understand is there just only a change 291 00:14:07,079 --> 00:14:11,417 in the number of the phytoplankton, or is it also actually community changing? 292 00:14:11,417 --> 00:14:14,954 Because going back, you know, like if you have a specific thing that depends 293 00:14:14,954 --> 00:14:19,692 and likes to eat, only peas and peas are disappearing, we have a problem. 294 00:14:19,792 --> 00:14:22,528 So like, you know, every new data set, 295 00:14:22,528 --> 00:14:25,764 I mean, every new vastness of data allows us to focus better on the problem. 296 00:14:25,764 --> 00:14:30,469 And yeah, there's the more data we have, the better decisions we can make. 297 00:14:30,469 --> 00:14:34,540 And what you're describing there like this species composition sort of thing. 298 00:14:34,540 --> 00:14:35,641 I mean that's kind of like the 299 00:14:35,641 --> 00:14:39,745 algal blooms, like from and from like agricultural runoff and things 300 00:14:39,745 --> 00:14:43,082 where it just kills an entire area because of the wrong-- Yes, Yes. 301 00:14:43,315 --> 00:14:45,017 And that's one of the things that's 302 00:14:45,284 --> 00:14:46,919 one of the things that we're going to be able to see. 303 00:14:46,919 --> 00:14:47,786 So think about, you know, 304 00:14:47,786 --> 00:14:50,856 like you have the coast of California, I went to grad school there. 305 00:14:50,856 --> 00:14:54,927 You know, you have this red bloom, a red tide blooms, or you have this 306 00:14:54,927 --> 00:14:59,331 like diatoms pseudo-nitzschia blooms that make birds and sea 307 00:14:59,331 --> 00:15:02,468 mammals kind of like a little bit cuckoo because it has a toxin 308 00:15:02,468 --> 00:15:04,370 that impacts their brain. 309 00:15:04,436 --> 00:15:05,571 So so 310 00:15:05,571 --> 00:15:08,807 by looking at it from space, if we can see it early, 311 00:15:08,908 --> 00:15:12,544 we can send a warning to the local, you know, like mammal 312 00:15:12,544 --> 00:15:17,016 society, decision makers, surfers and everybody who they kind of like lives. 313 00:15:17,082 --> 00:15:17,816 I mean, surfers. 314 00:15:17,816 --> 00:15:19,618 I mean, like they're there, they're out there. 315 00:15:19,618 --> 00:15:22,454 You didn't want them to be more cuckoo than they are, no? 316 00:15:22,454 --> 00:15:24,790 So so but you know and you would be surprised 317 00:15:24,790 --> 00:15:26,425 how much of that coastal communities 318 00:15:26,425 --> 00:15:30,796 actually plugged into our data, you know, because we really work hard 319 00:15:30,896 --> 00:15:34,533 to have those type of communities they're dependent on the ocean. 320 00:15:34,533 --> 00:15:37,736 The coastal communities have access to this data that we produce. 321 00:15:37,736 --> 00:15:39,905 We've been working for the last three years really closely 322 00:15:39,905 --> 00:15:45,244 with people like surfers, aquaculture people, fishermen, policy makers 323 00:15:45,244 --> 00:15:48,247 to actually start using PACE data the same second they come out 324 00:15:48,447 --> 00:15:50,582 so they can make this informed decision about ooh, 325 00:15:50,582 --> 00:15:52,351 there's a harmful algal bloom coming. 326 00:15:52,351 --> 00:15:56,355 We should maybe not, you know, pick oysters for like two weeks 327 00:15:56,355 --> 00:15:59,391 so we don't kill anybody who's going to eat those oysters and things like that. 328 00:15:59,391 --> 00:16:02,027 So that's all interconnected. Yep. 329 00:16:02,027 --> 00:16:02,561 I feel like the 330 00:16:02,561 --> 00:16:05,331 PACE mission needs to chat with more professional surfers. 331 00:16:05,431 --> 00:16:07,866 Like why did you get a rock climber, like, I'm into, 332 00:16:07,866 --> 00:16:08,901 you know, mountains and glaciers. 333 00:16:08,901 --> 00:16:10,536 We will make a surfer out of you 334 00:16:10,536 --> 00:16:12,771 like you go, you know, like I was like, you know, at one point 335 00:16:12,771 --> 00:16:14,640 you going to start exploring other spheres 336 00:16:14,640 --> 00:16:16,542 of the Earth then, you know, like, we're in the ocean, 337 00:16:16,542 --> 00:16:19,645 we welcome you, you know. But everything is interconnected, 338 00:16:19,645 --> 00:16:22,815 you know, like ocean controls in a sense climate. 339 00:16:22,815 --> 00:16:25,818 It controls a big portion, the cycle of the water. 340 00:16:25,951 --> 00:16:28,253 You can't climb if everything is wet, it gets slippery 341 00:16:28,253 --> 00:16:29,488 and you fall and you don't want to fall. 342 00:16:29,488 --> 00:16:32,691 So all these things-- --No, like I was saying 343 00:16:32,691 --> 00:16:36,362 in my last two big expeditions that were both for National Geographic 344 00:16:36,362 --> 00:16:40,032 TV shows, this summer was to Alaska, the summer before was to Greenland, 345 00:16:40,032 --> 00:16:42,401 but both of them involve boats to navigate fjords. 346 00:16:42,401 --> 00:16:44,236 Both of them 347 00:16:44,503 --> 00:16:48,007 went through, you know, basically the local communities all rely on fishing. 348 00:16:48,007 --> 00:16:49,008 So it's, 349 00:16:49,008 --> 00:16:52,878 you know, just makes your remember how much of the world is dependent. 350 00:16:52,878 --> 00:16:55,681 And then also, I mean, just with Arctic glaciers 351 00:16:55,681 --> 00:16:58,617 retreating, I mean, that is sea level rise, and that determines-- 352 00:16:58,617 --> 00:17:00,152 I mean, that's like hundreds of millions 353 00:17:00,152 --> 00:17:03,155 people around the Earth that are affected by by oceans rising. 354 00:17:03,288 --> 00:17:05,691 And so no matter, you know, I live in a desert. 355 00:17:05,691 --> 00:17:06,558 I mostly climb rocks. 356 00:17:06,558 --> 00:17:10,562 And so I don't often think about the ocean necessarily, but, you know, 357 00:17:10,562 --> 00:17:11,830 as soon as you go on an expedition, 358 00:17:11,830 --> 00:17:14,433 as soon as you really think about it, you're like the entire coast. 359 00:17:14,433 --> 00:17:17,836 I mean, that's you know, it's hundreds of millions of humans that are affected by 360 00:17:17,836 --> 00:17:19,705 what goes on at the oceans. 361 00:17:20,839 --> 00:17:21,173 Yeah. 362 00:17:21,173 --> 00:17:23,208 And in a sense, you know, like again, 363 00:17:23,208 --> 00:17:25,244 you know, you live in the desert, you climb and so on. 364 00:17:25,244 --> 00:17:27,446 But think about just like economically, 365 00:17:27,446 --> 00:17:29,815 there's a big portion of the protein coming from the ocean. 366 00:17:29,815 --> 00:17:31,450 Remove that source of protein. 367 00:17:31,450 --> 00:17:33,419 Now you have an impact from the rest of the, 368 00:17:33,419 --> 00:17:35,287 you know, protein sources on the land. 369 00:17:35,287 --> 00:17:38,424 So even if you don't eat fish, if you don't if you don't like fish, 370 00:17:38,424 --> 00:17:40,092 you don't care about the ocean, stuff like that. There's 371 00:17:40,092 --> 00:17:44,196 so many different routes that ocean, you know, that that's going to impact 372 00:17:44,196 --> 00:17:45,998 you. Just think about ocean transport. 373 00:17:45,998 --> 00:17:47,866 There's so, so, so many different things. 374 00:17:47,866 --> 00:17:52,304 I mean, ultimately, you know, for many of us, ocean is just not livelihood. 375 00:17:52,304 --> 00:17:54,873 Ocean is like, you know, part of our cultural heritage. 376 00:17:54,873 --> 00:17:56,842 I come from the coastal community. 377 00:17:56,842 --> 00:17:59,044 My parents come from two islands. 378 00:17:59,044 --> 00:18:00,712 It's just part of everything, 379 00:18:00,712 --> 00:18:04,683 you know, everything what I do, is comes, starts and ends with the ocean. 380 00:18:04,750 --> 00:18:06,585 Weather is associated with the ocean. 381 00:18:06,585 --> 00:18:08,053 The stories associate with the ocean. 382 00:18:08,053 --> 00:18:11,824 So, you know, ocean makes so many-- so much strong impact 383 00:18:11,824 --> 00:18:13,158 on all us around the Earth, 384 00:18:13,158 --> 00:18:16,562 regardless if we're close to the ocean or living in a desert like you are. 385 00:18:16,562 --> 00:18:19,264 And maybe the most underappreciated aspect, like you're saying, 386 00:18:19,264 --> 00:18:22,868 if it's absorbed 50% of the anthropogenic carbon. 387 00:18:22,868 --> 00:18:25,804 And that's something that's sort of nobody thinks about. 388 00:18:26,472 --> 00:18:29,108 I mean, the ocean is taking for granted as a as a 389 00:18:29,108 --> 00:18:33,145 repository for waste and for absorbing waste into the atmosphere and just kind of 390 00:18:33,212 --> 00:18:36,215 it's like a big emptiness that that helps clean 391 00:18:36,281 --> 00:18:39,618 that we never really think of, and, you know, sort of take for granted. 392 00:18:39,685 --> 00:18:42,087 Yeah, yeah. It's ocean. 393 00:18:42,087 --> 00:18:44,756 You don't see it far away from my eyes, far away from the mine. 394 00:18:44,756 --> 00:18:50,596 But it's there is big and it's controlling pretty much everything we do. 395 00:18:50,696 --> 00:18:53,632 So is there anything else you think I should know about the PACE mission? 396 00:18:53,632 --> 00:18:55,367 I mean-- It's pretty awesome. 397 00:18:55,367 --> 00:18:58,403 We’ve really covered the “P,” the phytoplankton, 398 00:18:58,403 --> 00:19:00,038 but is there anything else we should touch on? 399 00:19:00,038 --> 00:19:01,140 We should touch on the “A” and “C,” yeah. 400 00:19:01,140 --> 00:19:03,442 So aerosols and clouds. 401 00:19:03,442 --> 00:19:05,844 I can say a little bit about that if you're interested. 402 00:19:05,844 --> 00:19:08,514 So and this might be maybe more important for you. 403 00:19:08,514 --> 00:19:11,817 So like, you know, by having this amazing technology and that's, 404 00:19:11,884 --> 00:19:15,220 I spoke of just one of the instruments, which is this Ocean Color Instrument, 405 00:19:15,220 --> 00:19:19,124 this hyperspectral, we're going to have a two teeny tiny instruments on the side. 406 00:19:19,124 --> 00:19:21,793 They're looking at the polarization of the light. 407 00:19:21,793 --> 00:19:23,228 So like, you know, if you think about the light 408 00:19:23,228 --> 00:19:25,197 and you put the sunglasses to stop the glare, 409 00:19:25,197 --> 00:19:29,501 that's pretty much cutting out certain polarization aspects of the light. 410 00:19:29,501 --> 00:19:30,636 It's kind of hard to explain. 411 00:19:30,636 --> 00:19:33,172 But by looking at the polarization of the light, 412 00:19:33,172 --> 00:19:36,675 we can get even more information about the little things 413 00:19:36,675 --> 00:19:38,443 that live in the--I mean, the don't live--you know 414 00:19:38,443 --> 00:19:40,712 the little things that are in the atmosphere. 415 00:19:40,712 --> 00:19:43,148 So aerosols and clouds, 416 00:19:43,148 --> 00:19:47,319 understanding the interaction between those and different types of on clouds 417 00:19:47,319 --> 00:19:49,788 can really, really, really help us to understand 418 00:19:49,788 --> 00:19:53,192 the role of atmosphere and those guys and climate. 419 00:19:53,392 --> 00:19:55,894 We really kind of don't know too much about it. 420 00:19:55,894 --> 00:19:59,598 And PACE is really with with the suite of instruments that it has, 421 00:19:59,598 --> 00:20:04,636 not just a main one can really answer and, you know, give us answer to those 422 00:20:04,636 --> 00:20:11,076 really big questions about role of that, our aerosols in clouds and climate, 423 00:20:11,143 --> 00:20:12,844 but ultimately rolling back to human health. 424 00:20:12,844 --> 00:20:15,280 It kind of like most of people think about this like, 425 00:20:15,280 --> 00:20:17,382 I don't know, where were you during this Canadian fires? 426 00:20:17,382 --> 00:20:20,219 Probably back in the desert, and you didn't really care about them, 427 00:20:20,219 --> 00:20:22,387 but we were like, choking out of here. --This summer? 428 00:20:22,387 --> 00:20:23,522 Yeah, Yeah. 429 00:20:23,522 --> 00:20:24,156 You know, actually. 430 00:20:24,156 --> 00:20:28,594 So the expedition that I was on, it ended with a boat in Alaska, 431 00:20:28,694 --> 00:20:30,429 and we were getting to this peak in Alaska, 432 00:20:30,429 --> 00:20:32,598 but we actually started by bicycling from Colorado. 433 00:20:32,598 --> 00:20:36,668 So we bicycled from there in Colorado up to the Canadian border, 434 00:20:36,668 --> 00:20:39,004 and they got in a boat and sailed up into southeast Alaska. 435 00:20:39,004 --> 00:20:42,975 So we actually biked like right through the center of a lot of those fires. 436 00:20:43,208 --> 00:20:48,247 But just by sheer good fortune happened to nail like this five day weather window. 437 00:20:48,247 --> 00:20:51,250 And we kind of like managed to thread the needle and it all worked out for us. 438 00:20:51,350 --> 00:20:53,952 And so we actually weren't too impacted by fires, 439 00:20:53,952 --> 00:20:56,355 but we were sort of threatened by them the entire time. 440 00:20:56,355 --> 00:20:58,857 And and, you know, had a few days of heavy smoke. 441 00:20:58,857 --> 00:21:02,561 But generally we were like, it was pretty crazy. 442 00:21:02,661 --> 00:21:06,298 It was it was disgusting and like biking through that, it's a no-no. 443 00:21:06,298 --> 00:21:08,400 I mean, like, we couldn't go out here for a couple of days in D.C. 444 00:21:08,400 --> 00:21:11,036 and I can just not imagine it was further up north. 445 00:21:11,036 --> 00:21:13,472 So those kind of things, I mean, like looking at back 446 00:21:13,472 --> 00:21:16,575 at the climate change and things they will be happening in the future. 447 00:21:16,575 --> 00:21:19,578 However much we wish them not happening, they will be happening. 448 00:21:19,678 --> 00:21:20,379 These kind of events 449 00:21:20,379 --> 00:21:24,216 are going to be happening more and more, and PACE is going to be able to observe 450 00:21:24,283 --> 00:21:27,286 that information and give kind of like 451 00:21:27,386 --> 00:21:30,689 better source of data, better information about you know, 452 00:21:30,689 --> 00:21:34,026 where does that those those type of aerosols are going to go? 453 00:21:34,026 --> 00:21:34,893 How are they going to merge? 454 00:21:34,893 --> 00:21:35,927 How are they going to change? 455 00:21:35,927 --> 00:21:37,796 And ultimately, how is that going to impact, 456 00:21:37,796 --> 00:21:41,366 you know, our livelihood and livelihood of the rest of the ecosystem? 457 00:21:41,366 --> 00:21:42,434 We think about ourselves. 458 00:21:42,434 --> 00:21:44,903 But, you know, what about the little creatures that live in the forest? 459 00:21:44,903 --> 00:21:47,005 You know, like we can hide inside. 460 00:21:47,005 --> 00:21:51,610 But yeah, so so there's lots of information 461 00:21:51,610 --> 00:21:54,279 about both ocean and atmosphere that they're really getting and 462 00:21:54,279 --> 00:21:57,916 getting those to together is really cool because they talk to each other, you know. 463 00:21:58,116 --> 00:22:00,152 They exchange things, you know. 464 00:22:00,152 --> 00:22:02,788 Like think about volcano, it drops certain things in the ocean 465 00:22:02,788 --> 00:22:05,590 and that's food and the phytoplankton bloom. 466 00:22:05,590 --> 00:22:08,160 And there's so many cool stories that are going to come out of it. 467 00:22:08,160 --> 00:22:12,597 So, yeah, that's another thing that you should know about PACE. 468 00:22:12,664 --> 00:22:16,735 Actually, maybe two more really basic questions about PACE. 469 00:22:16,802 --> 00:22:19,438 One, how long is this supposed to last? 470 00:22:19,438 --> 00:22:20,672 Like how long is the mission? 471 00:22:20,672 --> 00:22:21,740 That's a great question. 472 00:22:21,740 --> 00:22:25,444 There is an official length of a mission, and unofficial length of a mission. 473 00:22:25,510 --> 00:22:29,815 Officially, I think we are on the books to last for three years. 474 00:22:29,815 --> 00:22:33,085 And one of the media people might correct me in the one, 475 00:22:33,151 --> 00:22:36,555 but unofficially it has the fuel to last for a very long time. 476 00:22:36,555 --> 00:22:40,992 So, for example, the mission that is currently operating is called 477 00:22:40,992 --> 00:22:42,361 MODIS, MODIS Aqua. 478 00:22:42,361 --> 00:22:44,262 That's a really important mission 479 00:22:44,262 --> 00:22:46,932 that is once again looking at the color of the Earth. 480 00:22:46,932 --> 00:22:50,869 That one was launched in the same way, but it was launched 20 years ago. 481 00:22:50,936 --> 00:22:53,772 So we say three years. 482 00:22:53,772 --> 00:22:56,408 Ultimately, we hope we're going to be lasting really, really long time 483 00:22:56,408 --> 00:23:02,314 and keep on giving this information to all of us to do some cool science. 484 00:23:02,314 --> 00:23:06,451 So you're saying that that NASA's satellites are a lot like every other home 485 00:23:06,451 --> 00:23:07,719 applicance where your warranty is for 486 00:23:07,719 --> 00:23:10,222 like five or ten years, but you hope that will last for 30? 487 00:23:10,222 --> 00:23:13,492 You just hope that it keeps working as long as possible. --Yeah, pretty, pretty much. 488 00:23:13,492 --> 00:23:14,426 And we know that is going to 489 00:23:14,426 --> 00:23:18,330 last a long time, but it's like, okay, this is not going to end up anywhere. 490 00:23:18,363 --> 00:23:19,865 Okay. Three years is right. Thank you, Kate. 491 00:23:19,865 --> 00:23:21,566 This part is going to be cut out. 492 00:23:21,566 --> 00:23:24,903 It's just the level of bureaucracy that it takes from taking the mission from 493 00:23:24,970 --> 00:23:29,374 three years to five years would put such a financial over, you know, 494 00:23:29,441 --> 00:23:30,942 drain on the system. 495 00:23:30,942 --> 00:23:32,244 This this won’t cut out. 496 00:23:32,244 --> 00:23:34,579 I think that's an important thing, though, is that 497 00:23:34,579 --> 00:23:36,948 I mean, because that's was true in all aspects 498 00:23:36,948 --> 00:23:40,252 of human life, in that you can only even on the guarantee a few years. 499 00:23:40,252 --> 00:23:42,888 But you can sort of hope for more. And you can assume that it’s going to work. 500 00:23:42,888 --> 00:23:43,622 Exactly. 501 00:23:43,622 --> 00:23:47,325 I mean, wasn't that true for the Mars rover, whatever? Didn’t that last way longer than it was supposed to? 502 00:23:47,325 --> 00:23:50,762 That’s true for every mission that is put out there. 503 00:23:50,762 --> 00:23:52,130 We always put extra fuel. 504 00:23:52,130 --> 00:23:54,132 We always like, you know, the amount of fuel--we 505 00:23:54,132 --> 00:23:57,202 just fueled the satellite, which is a really exciting. No. 506 00:23:57,202 --> 00:24:00,205 And if you think about a majority of the fuel is actually going to be used 507 00:24:00,439 --> 00:24:02,874 to burn the satellite when it’s coming back to the atmosphere. 508 00:24:02,874 --> 00:24:05,444 So it doesn't like land somewhere in the middle of the desert. 509 00:24:05,444 --> 00:24:08,480 But that small percentage of the fuel that's going to be used there 510 00:24:08,480 --> 00:24:12,250 to kind of like control its orbit can last for ten years or more 511 00:24:12,350 --> 00:24:15,086 if we're like really smart and just find smart, 512 00:24:15,086 --> 00:24:16,721 smart people working in NASA, and they're going 513 00:24:16,721 --> 00:24:19,257 to, you know, spin around and use it other different ways 514 00:24:19,257 --> 00:24:22,027 to control that orbit, not to spend it all that fuel. 515 00:24:22,027 --> 00:24:25,697 And instruments in theory, you know, even if they start degrading 516 00:24:25,697 --> 00:24:27,732 and we have put so many different 517 00:24:27,732 --> 00:24:31,670 checks in system that we can, even with the degrading instruments, 518 00:24:31,670 --> 00:24:36,007 we can still do good to science because, you know, we calibrate against the Sun 519 00:24:36,007 --> 00:24:37,809 Moon, calibrate against the Moon, recalibrate 520 00:24:37,809 --> 00:24:41,913 against some spots in the ocean where we have these buoys that you talked about. 521 00:24:41,980 --> 00:24:44,850 So, you know, it can last if you take care of it 522 00:24:44,850 --> 00:24:47,953 like your home appliance, it can last for very long time. 523 00:24:47,953 --> 00:24:48,720 Totally. 524 00:24:48,720 --> 00:24:51,289 And you have a bunch of the smartest people in the world taking care of it. 525 00:24:51,289 --> 00:24:53,892 So you’re like, ah. Yeah. It's probably going to last pretty well. 526 00:24:53,959 --> 00:24:57,162 Actually that maybe brings me to my most basic question, 527 00:24:57,162 --> 00:24:59,431 which I probably should've started with, but the PACE mission, 528 00:24:59,431 --> 00:25:02,667 I mean, so we're just referring to a satellite that orbits the Earth? 529 00:25:03,034 --> 00:25:06,137 Yes, it's a satellite, but it’s a very cute satellite? --Like the PACE mission is one object? 530 00:25:06,137 --> 00:25:08,573 How big is the satellite? Like, what is it? 531 00:25:09,641 --> 00:25:13,645 So imagine two suburban 532 00:25:13,645 --> 00:25:16,615 mom minivans plumped together. 533 00:25:16,715 --> 00:25:19,551 That's your size. 534 00:25:19,551 --> 00:25:21,786 So like and it looks like a cube. 535 00:25:21,786 --> 00:25:24,956 And then on top, actually on the side, 536 00:25:24,956 --> 00:25:28,727 if I sit up here,you have the big instrument, called Ocean Color Instrument. 537 00:25:28,727 --> 00:25:29,794 And this one is pretty large. 538 00:25:29,794 --> 00:25:34,666 You know, it's going to like as this and it kind of sits on top of that box. 539 00:25:34,666 --> 00:25:38,570 And then the two, two other satellites--the 540 00:25:38,637 --> 00:25:41,306 two other instruments, the polarization ones, 541 00:25:41,306 --> 00:25:43,508 the polarimeter ones, those are the CubeSats. 542 00:25:43,508 --> 00:25:44,643 So know what a CubeSat is? 543 00:25:44,643 --> 00:25:47,312 That’s a teeny tiny satellites that launch in space independently. 544 00:25:47,312 --> 00:25:48,880 Everybody can launch them. 545 00:25:48,880 --> 00:25:52,083 So we took those and we attached them to the satellite. 546 00:25:52,150 --> 00:25:54,119 So these are the these are made not by NASA. 547 00:25:54,119 --> 00:25:57,622 So these are made by the collaborators, either in Netherlands 548 00:25:57,622 --> 00:26:01,159 or here at University of Maryland, Baltimore County. 549 00:26:01,226 --> 00:26:04,129 And so we just attached them there and connected to the you know, 550 00:26:04,129 --> 00:26:06,765 to the to the computer of the of the satellite. 551 00:26:06,765 --> 00:26:08,533 And what are those satellites for? 552 00:26:09,000 --> 00:26:10,368 So those are the instruments. 553 00:26:10,368 --> 00:26:14,406 So those are predominantly going to be looking--so instruments on the satellite, 554 00:26:14,472 --> 00:26:16,107 they're going to be-- they’re teeny tiny satellites. 555 00:26:16,107 --> 00:26:18,376 But we kind of attach them to the big satellite. 556 00:26:18,376 --> 00:26:20,245 They're going to be looking mostly at atmosphere, 557 00:26:20,245 --> 00:26:22,480 but we're hoping we're going to be able to kind of like 558 00:26:22,480 --> 00:26:25,150 check out the ocean a little bit with them as well. 559 00:26:25,417 --> 00:26:26,651 So it's sort of modular. 560 00:26:26,651 --> 00:26:30,021 You have like the main NASA instrument and then you add other 561 00:26:30,021 --> 00:26:31,556 sort of add-on features. 562 00:26:31,556 --> 00:26:34,259 It’s like adding lenses onto a camera or something like that. 563 00:26:34,259 --> 00:26:35,460 In a sense. 564 00:26:35,460 --> 00:26:38,530 In a sense, think about like, you know, going back to the buoy that you deployed 565 00:26:38,530 --> 00:26:42,334 in Greenland, that buoy can have a bunch of different instruments. 566 00:26:42,400 --> 00:26:44,869 So the one that you'd probably deployed had, I think 567 00:26:44,869 --> 00:26:47,872 temperature, salinity, oxygen probably, and maybe something else. 568 00:26:48,073 --> 00:26:51,309 So you can attach instruments and once you're building the satellite, 569 00:26:51,309 --> 00:26:55,246 which is pretty much, you know, like your home for all these instruments, 570 00:26:55,347 --> 00:26:59,851 if other other agencies have an instrument, they want to contribute. 571 00:26:59,851 --> 00:27:04,222 Very often NASA's works with other, you know, agencies or institutions 572 00:27:04,289 --> 00:27:06,825 because very expensive, you know, to launch a thing in space. 573 00:27:06,825 --> 00:27:08,326 So you just kind of attach things. 574 00:27:08,326 --> 00:27:11,429 That's actually maybe the biggest lesson that I learned from that expedition 575 00:27:11,429 --> 00:27:15,300 to Greenland was how much, you know, because we were in the most remote part 576 00:27:15,300 --> 00:27:16,768 of eastern Greenland, the middle of nowhere, 577 00:27:16,768 --> 00:27:19,371 and it's really hard to get there, it’s really expensive to get there. 578 00:27:19,371 --> 00:27:23,908 And so we had a scientist with us, Heidi Sevestre, who's a French glaciologist, 579 00:27:23,908 --> 00:27:28,813 and she was basically executing sort of experiments for universities 580 00:27:28,813 --> 00:27:31,816 all over the world because it's just so hard for people to get there. 581 00:27:31,816 --> 00:27:35,120 And so it made me realize that a lot of science is that opportunity. 582 00:27:35,120 --> 00:27:35,654 It’s like, 583 00:27:35,654 --> 00:27:39,791 if somebody is going to a place, then like send them, send them a PDF of the experiment 584 00:27:39,791 --> 00:27:42,694 that you want them to do and they’ll like, bring you back some data. 585 00:27:42,694 --> 00:27:45,096 So it's funny to hear that even at the highest levels of science, 586 00:27:45,096 --> 00:27:47,932 like NASA’s sending satellites to space, there's still some other universities, 587 00:27:47,932 --> 00:27:50,969 it’s like, Hey, let us just like tack on an extra little piece on your satellite 588 00:27:50,969 --> 00:27:52,370 so we can get some data too. 589 00:27:53,004 --> 00:27:53,304 Yeah. 590 00:27:53,304 --> 00:27:55,874 And again, it's not as opportunistic as, you know, 591 00:27:55,874 --> 00:27:58,343 like there's there's lots of reviews and things, but, 592 00:27:58,343 --> 00:28:02,380 but it's pretty much that's how science works. You know, like it's 593 00:28:02,380 --> 00:28:04,482 how important it is, you know, like 594 00:28:04,482 --> 00:28:07,452 there is only a certain amount of money that is going to come our way, going 595 00:28:07,452 --> 00:28:10,855 on, on field, going in space is extremely expensive. 596 00:28:10,855 --> 00:28:12,424 So, like, you know, 597 00:28:12,424 --> 00:28:14,392 --Understandably so. --I’ve been to Greenland myself--I’m sorry 598 00:28:14,392 --> 00:28:15,827 I said “understandably so.” 599 00:28:15,827 --> 00:28:16,995 I mean, it's you know, 600 00:28:16,995 --> 00:28:18,329 it sounds like basically the hardest thing 601 00:28:18,329 --> 00:28:21,666 you can imagine doing is sending something into orbit and then keeping it in orbit. 602 00:28:21,666 --> 00:28:23,435 And like all the instruments involved, it 603 00:28:23,435 --> 00:28:25,937 totally makes sense that if you're doing all that work, 604 00:28:25,937 --> 00:28:31,009 somebody else should be should be reaping some benefit from it as well to like learn more in a different way. 605 00:28:31,009 --> 00:28:35,346 And exactly the same way as in the field, You know, like it's 606 00:28:35,480 --> 00:28:38,850 every time you go in a field, you're collecting your stuff and then you're 607 00:28:38,850 --> 00:28:42,721 collecting water and samples for so many, many, many more people 608 00:28:42,787 --> 00:28:46,758 because it's just yeah, it's once you going there, you know, bring everybody 609 00:28:46,758 --> 00:28:50,628 along and make sure that everybody really benefits of this once 610 00:28:50,628 --> 00:28:51,830 in a lifetime opportunity. 611 00:28:51,830 --> 00:28:56,401 Like in ocean we don't get that many satellites, especially ocean biology. 612 00:28:56,468 --> 00:28:58,870 The last one we got was what, 20 years ago. 613 00:28:58,870 --> 00:29:01,973 So like, you know, it's a good opportunity to jump on the board. 614 00:29:02,140 --> 00:29:04,142 Totally, totally. Well cool, 615 00:29:04,142 --> 00:29:06,811 well, thank you so much for taking the time, and I appreciate chatting, 616 00:29:06,811 --> 00:29:09,514 yeah, good luck with the mission. Hope you guys learn a lot. 617 00:29:09,547 --> 00:29:10,448 Thank you.