SpaceMika

As promised, this is a look at the chemistry and geology presented in the pilot episode of Stargate: Universe, “Air” (part 1, 2, 3). Our heroes are on a spaceship with a life support system with a non-functional filtration system, and need to come up with a way to sequester the carbon dioxide. They head down to a sandy planet in search of calcium carbonate.

“How come our heroes couldn’t just hold the Stargate open to a planet with a nice, tasty atmosphere?”
That would violate the defined functionality of the Stargate established earlier in Stargate: SG-1 and Stargate: Atlantis. The Stargates prevent the transport of individual molecules, which is handy when the teams connect to space-gates (vacuum on the far side) or submerged gates (water, water everywhere!).

“Wait, if the problem is too much carbon dioxide, how come they’re looking for calcium carbonate? Won’t that just mean they have even more carbon to deal with?!”
Yes, but no.

As carbon dioxide dissolves into water, the water becomes more acidic. Calcium carbonate dissolves in pretty much any acid, and slews of carbonate ions running rampant will form bicarbonate. So, if you chuck a bunch of calcium carbonate into water and add carbon dioxide, the calcium carbonate will dissolve in the acidic water, and all the ionized carbonate will form bicarbonate instead.

This is a well-known phenomena (see here for instructions on how to demonstrate it), and it’s an acceptable hypothesis that shell sediments in the ocean help buffer the acidity from increased carbon dioxide in the atmosphere (see here for an older summary of a Science paper on the topic), so it’s within the realm of plausible science to use the chemical reaction for science fiction.

“…if lime reacts with carbon dioxide to make calcium carbonate, and then calcium carbonate reacts with more carbon dioxide to make bicarbonates, why not start with lime?”
Our heroes didn’t manage to bring the medical-grade lime with them; very unfortunate. Yes, the system would be more efficient if our heroes made lime-enriched water and let that react happily away with the carbon dioxide because then it would sequester carbon twice over, but lime isn’t as easy for novices to identify via field test as calcium carbonate. Calcium carbonate comes as three minerals: aragonite, calcite, and vaterite. They are polymorphs — identical chemicals but different structure — so all of them dissolve in acid. The standard test is to add a drop of 10% HCl, and if it bubbles merrily away, you found calcium carbonate (or drop the rock in the acid for more bubbles!).

“I saw no bubbles. I saw red.”
Eh, red is prettier, or the geologist had prissier field gear because she’s used to alien atmospheres and walking around with acid could be dangerous, or maybe they used something that reacts to changes in pH by going red (cabbage juice turns red in acids (pH below 7), purple when neutral (pH = 7) and blue (pH above 7) or green (pH above 9) with bases), or in the rush to evacuate the base they left behind the hydrochloric acid and had to improvise from the material they had on hand.

“But wait! The chemical reaction is reversible with heat, so why did they hunt for rocks instead of just boiling their old life support goo on the planet?”
Eh, they couldn’t find a cauldron to hold it that didn’t dissolve into muck when handling the goo, or the goo had other chemical reactions going on (you need more than just “less carbon dioxide” to keep a human happy and the montage did include some prep of a white foam) and would do Very Bad Things when heated, or the Ancient goo wasn’t even using this particular chemical reaction to scrub carbon dioxide, or… ie, the chemistry is good and the concepts are good, and the details fall within plausible exceptions for science fiction.

“Why’d they go hunting for calcium carbonate in dried-up lakes or oceans?”
Limestone, chalk, and sea shells on Earth are all high in calcium carbonate; when faced with an alien planet and limited time, the hope that alien sea shells are chemically similar is both plausible, and gives some sort of constraint to guide our luckless heroes.

I’m giving a departmental talk tomorrow if anyone is interested:

Check out the clip titled “Earth Not Good for Life”. You can see why we had enough to chat about on set when filming “Brain Storm”.

Full credit to Mallozzi-blog commenter DP (see comment #39) for discovering the treatment to this rare condition:

Treatment involves mac and cheese dinners and watching Mega Shark vs. Giant Octopus

Months later, I’m still loving Mega Shark vs. Giant Octopus — who can fail to love a science montage with scientists in lab coats pouring coloured liquids in beakers to determine the length of a footprint? Although with news reports of a giant 6 m shark off the coast of Queensland, maybe the story is a bit more plausible than intended…

Did you see the premiere last night? No? If you’re stateside, SyFy is streaming episodes, and for others in northern lands of snow & Stargates, Space has our backs. Once you decide you love the series, iTunes will let you buy a season pass.

The first episode, “Air” is a multi-part episode. So far it has drama, action, astrophysics, atmospheric science, and deep philosophical questions. Once we go in-depth into geology, I’ll post a bit of the science-behind-Stargate. ETA: a few weeks.

In the meantime, the Monkey & I already got into quite a debate over the ethics presented in the first episode: a Vulcan “The good of the many before the good of the few” vs. the SG-1 “Never leave a man behind.”

I’ve finally figured out how to watch the premiere of Stargate: Universe despite my lack of both T.V. and cable. Sure, I’ll be a bit delayed and watching in lower-resolution, but I’ll still get to watch!

I remember watching a series of commercials for the SciFi T.V. network back in the day that featured the word “if” having “scifi” fade in around it. It was compelling for me, both for its graphic simplicity and for being my first exposure to the concept of science fiction being the “what if?” of science.

It is really hard to find copies of the old promos online with the search terms scifi channel and if. All I found was a rather long What if the dog went to work and the human stayed home? Joanne proved her salt as the daughter of a reference librarian, and was far, far, far more successful:

• a boy in a force-field bubble
• a whole collection of bumpers, including my favourite fantastic creature
• unraveling hair
• transformer puppy (ending incomplete)
• and the more disturbing balloon puppy
• prickly woman and the related puffy man
• the ridiculously adorable helping a penguin cross a lake
• Butterfly Woman and Jack-in-the-Box (both low resolution)
• a very safe crosswalk

Now the real question is: which one serves my purpose best to quickly introduce others to the same “what if?” philosophy of science fiction?

edit: Re: SciFi becoming SyFy
I am with the grousing masses in considering the spelling change unnecessary, marketing-driven, and gimmicky. I strongly doubt they’ll go with “yF” fading into “SyFy,” so their new ad spots are unlikely to be poached by me for educational purposes.

Spider Robinson’s “Melancholy Elephants” short story collection might be the first science fiction I ever read. I’m frequently appalled by my fellow scifi geeks who haven’t yet experienced the joy, and buy copies of the now out-of-print anthology every time I discover it in used book stores.

The title piece, Melancholy Elephants” not only taught me how to spell melancholy, it also became a family catchphrase for a set of concepts regarding copyright law. If you haven’t heard of it, I highly recommend it as an afternoon read.

Hal Clement’s “Whirlygig World” essay is a strong influence on my opinions of science fiction:

Writing a science fiction story is fun, not work. … the fun… lies in treating the whole thing as a game. … the rules must be quite simple. They are; for the reader of a science-fiction story, they consist of finding as many as possible of the author’s statements or implications which conflict with the facts as science currently understands them. For the author, the rule is to make as few such slips as he possibly can … Certain exceptions are made [e.g., to allow travel faster than the speed of light], but fair play demands that all such matters be mentioned as early as possible in the story…

As it is easier to destroy than create, I usually focus on finding ways to support the science described than to chop it down, but otherwise I fully subscribe to the rules for playing with science fiction.

To further my affection for Clement’s writing, while doing research for a talk I’m giving for the Summer Science Program next month, I came across the following quote from his “Uncommon Sense”:

[F]or a scientist “belief” has not the same meaning as for a Fundamentalist; all scientific ideas, including the belief that the earth is approximately spherical in shape, are tentative and subject to revision if more and better data come in. (This is why the remark “Evolution is only an unproved theory” so often uttered by its opponents is so irritating. It’s a truth with false implications, like “Jerry Falwell was sober last Sunday. “)

I am delighted by the phrase, a truth with false implications.

I haven’t made a Stargate post in a while. This is because I left my copy of SG:A “Brain Storm” in Canada so still haven’t been able to watch it (ARGH!), and because I had to pass off my equation-writing duties to another while I am down under (tiny heartbreak), so I really don’t have much to say.

On my flight from Melbourne to Adelaide, over a month ago now, two avid fans shared my row. I figured this out by their discussing Vancouver as a sacred city (home to The Studio and high density of filming locations), an upcoming Con, and a strong affection for one of the actors. Of course, the gate symbol tattooed on a wrist might have also been a clue… It made for an interesting, if surreal, flight.

The Aussie SciFi network (not yet SyFy) is advertising Stargate as part of the Star Trek family. I have no explanation for this, but find it downright strange. They are showing an interview clip with an extremely young Will Riker (Jonathan Frakes) enthusing over how welcoming the fans were, that they saw him and the rest of NextGen as an extension of the Star Trek story, not a replacement to Captain Kirk and the rest of his rambunctious crew. I really hope the cast of Stargate: Universe will be able to say the same thing.

Creative consultant for SG:U, John Scalzi, posted about being a consultant. It captures the mix of bemusement and delight perfectly.