Barb Mattson:
Hi, it's Barb, MeeplePhD, with another Cosmic
Game Connection.
Barb Mattson:
NASA recently announced that it's NICER telescope
on the International Space Station provided
data to astronomers that allowed them to produce
the first ever surface map of a pulsar.
Now, pulsars are a type of neutron star, which
are in turn the collapsed core of a star that
died in a supernova explosion.
Pulsars get their name because they have beams
of light that sweep in and out of our view,
causing them to appear to blink as the star
rotates.
Barb Mattson:
NICER's ultimate goal is to help us understand
what's inside a neutron star.
These objects are so squished that they're
a state of matter that we cannot replicate
in labs on earth, and in fact they're the
state of matter that happens just before a
star turns into a black hole.
By using NICER's exquisite x-ray timing abilities,
it can provide data that leads to these surface
maps, and these surface maps allow astronomers
to determine both the mass and the radius
of a neutron star.
And that's exactly what this measurement was
doing, but it came with a few surprises.
Barb Mattson:
For a long time, we've been drawing our models
of pulsars with two beams of light coming
from circular spots that arise from interactions
between particles and the pulsar's magnetic
field colliding with a pulsar's surface.
And we've pictured that magnetic field to
be much like earth with poles on opposite
sides of the pulsar.
But two different teams using two different
analyses found that this pulsar, called J0030,
did indeed have two spots, but one was circular
and one was elongated, and both of them were
on the southern hemisphere of this star.
And in fact, one of the teams found a third
spot also on the southern hemisphere.
Barb Mattson:
Now both teams agreed that J0030 has a mass
of about 1.4 times that of our sun and a radius
of about 16 miles.
Now, this single result isn't yet enough to
tell us about the insides of neutron stars,
but it is enough to tell us that these objects
are a bit more complicated than our simple
models would lead us to believe.
So stay tuned to NASA's NICER to see what
else we can learn about these wacky stellar
corpses.
Barb Mattson:
When I heard about this bizarre pulsar, the
game that came to mind was perhaps the obvious
choice, Pulsar 2849.
It's in the name.
Pulsar 2849 is a dice drafting and action
selection game where players imagine a future
where we have harnessed the power of pulsars.
Players must new star systems, patent new
technologies, and distribute this pulsar harnessed
power throughout the galaxy.
Barb Mattson:
The game is set up with the exploration board
in the center of the table along with the
technology board, the dice board, the die
modifiers and the gyrodyne board.
Three goal tiles are chosen at random and
played face up.
The transmitters are sorted and shuffled in,
and the first three of those are set up.
And a number of silver dice, depending on
the player count, are placed in the center
of the board.
Players take the rocket ships, player markers
and pulsar rings of their color and also take
one of the die modifiers.
The game is played in eight rounds, with each
round having three phases.
Barb Mattson:
The first phase — the dice phase — the
first player rolls all of the silver dice
and places them in their appropriate places
on the dice track, and then they determine
the median position and mark that as well.
And then players start drafting the dice.
Two per player in a snake style draft with
the turn order determined by the initiative
track.
Players must also move one of their engineering
or initiative markers up or down based on
whether or not they draft a die that's above
or below the median.
Barb Mattson:
In the second phase, players use their dice
to select various actions.
These actions include flying their rocket
around and claiming planets or pulsars, patenting
certain technologies, claiming or completing
transmitters, completing projects on their
headquarters, taking or spinning up gyrodynes,
or simply taking a dye modifier if they need
it.
In addition, it's possible for a player to
get a bonus die — the red die — on their
turn.
They must spend it on their turn and they
have a max of one per round.
Barb Mattson:
And then there's the final phase, the production
phase.
The new turn order is determined based on
the initiative track, and bonuses are handed
out for the position on the engineering track,
for certain technologies and transmitters,
and for spinning gyrodynes, and then players
prepare for the next round.
Barb Mattson:
After eight rounds, players do a set of game
end scoring.
This includes scoring the game end goals,
getting points for certain technologies, getting
points for leftover engineering cubes or gyrodynes,
points for their position on the initiative
track, and a bunch of points maybe for how
many star systems they've claimed.
The player with the most points wins.
Barb Mattson:
Now when I play Pulsar 2849, I think about
the real pulsars that we've discovered.
These amazingly bizarre objects don't quite
get the respect they deserve.
Think about this, they pack the mass of our
sun into a region no bigger than the island
of Manhattan.
Some of them spin faster than blender blades,
and they have amazingly strong magnetic fields.
They're incredible.
So the next time you pull out Pulsar 2849
and you find yourself spinning up a gyrodyne,
take just one second and think about these
amazing objects and the new unique picture
that we're getting of them thanks to NASA's
NICER telescope.
Barb Mattson:
Thanks for joining me.
If you're enjoying these videos, please subscribe
to my channel so they'll show up in your feed.
I'll come to you again with another Cosmic
Game Connection soon.
But in the meantime, you can follow me on
Instagram and Twitter as @meeplephd, and you
can follow my blog at meeplephd.com.
Barb Mattson:
And that's exactly what this instrument was
doing ... And that's exactly what this measurement
was doing.
That's what ... And that's ...
