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I just recovered from the archive some of the sounds encoded in that disk
[audio from the disk is heard]
I think we just heard greetings in Akkadian, Dutch, German, Arabic
There is also a selection of music, sounds, images from Earth
instructions in symbolic language to explain the origin of the probe and how to play the record
We are about to reach the wormhole entry point. We need to jump in five minutes
We’ve slowed down, there’s still a few minutes before engaging the wormhole
A wormhole is a shortcut between two distant points in the Universe
It’s a bit like travelling from Liverpool to Sidney through the Earth’s interior instead of flying around the globe
The wormhole has two entrances, called mouths
they are connected to each other by a tunnel through hyperspace that can be just a few kilometres long
We are heading towards one mouth of the approaching wormhole
the other end is situated about 50 light years away around the star Tau Bootis
at this speed we will traverse the wormhole in a couple of seconds
Wormholes can be constructed following standard laws of physics but we are unable to create a stable wormhole in practise
These are the mouths of several wormholes scattered throughout the Milky Way
We know of their existence thanks to the Santorio anomaly, a signal detected more than 10 years ago by the Santorio satellite
The signal lasted only five hours
but it’s taken us several years to decode what seems to be a map of shortcuts throughout the galaxy and beyond
The signal appeared to be coming from the other side of this wormhole
We think that’s its source is around the star Tau Bootis
Whoever sent this message may also be responsible for creating this net of wormholes
[Dave] 30 seconds to crossing
We have been orbiting the star Tau Bootis B for several days searching for answers about the origin of the Santorio anomaly
There is a giant gas planet like Jupiter orbiting this star
it’s called Tau Bootis B and was one of the first extra-solar planets during the last decade of the 20th century
Checking the historical records I found that in 2003
Chris Leigh a scientist from John Moores University led a study of the sun light reflected by the planet
Tau Bootis is a star which is not very different from the Sun
Its mass is 40% larger, its radius is 50% larger
and the surface temperature is about 6,000 degree Celsius which is about 500 degrees hotter than the Sun itself
Now Tau Bootis B is its giant gas planet probably about 6-7 times the mass of Jupiter
and it moves around in a very very close orbit to its parent star, with an orbital period of just around 3 days
that would mean the length of the year on this planet would be only three days
It’s thought that the star is heating the planet to around 1500 degrees centigrade
and that the stellar winds from the star are slowly blowing parts of the planet off into space
Tau Bootis B was discovered back in 1996 by studying the motion of the parent star
We have completed our study of Tau Bootis, its giant planet and its satellites
We did not find any sign of intelligent activity in this system
We are now close to the companion star of Tau Bootis, a red dwarf with mass about 20% of the solar mass, half the solar radius
orbiting the more massive neighbour in 2000 years, at a distance of about 30 billion kilometres
There is a planet like Mars so close to its star that it’s become tidally locked
It takes about 20 days to rotate around its axis as well as to orbit the star
Therefore one hemisphere is always facing the star the same way that the Moon does with the Earth
As a consequence, one side of the planet is in perpetual daylight and the other in eternal night
This creates large temperature variations between the two sides
mitigated by the heat transferred from dayside to nightside by the planet’s atmosphere
I’m now going to travel to the planet, and will show you some detail of its surface
Dave, tell Mike I’m going down to the surface for a short broadcast
On my way to the planet. I’m going to land in the twilight zone between dayside and nightside
The approach route is programmed
Dave, any news?
[Dave] Again, no sign of intelligent activity, not yet
Maybe it was a transmitter of some sort, programmed to send us just one message
[Dave] No detection of artificial bodies in the system. Will keep scanning
[Off camera announcement] Maurizio you have half an hour on the surface for the public log
Ok, I won’t stay a minute longer
Scanning for a landing site
scanning the surface
starting landing procedures