Return-path: X-Andrew-Authenticated-as: 7997;andrew.cmu.edu;Ted Anderson Received: from corsica.andrew.cmu.edu via trymail for +dist+/afs/andrew.cmu.edu/usr1/ota/space/space.dl@andrew.cmu.edu (->+dist+/afs/andrew.cmu.edu/usr1/ota/space/space.dl) (->ota+space.digests) ID ; Wed, 28 Jun 89 05:17:25 -0400 (EDT) Message-ID: <8Ye9SQe00UkVEN5k4y@andrew.cmu.edu> Reply-To: space+@Andrew.CMU.EDU From: space-request+@Andrew.CMU.EDU To: space+@Andrew.CMU.EDU Date: Wed, 28 Jun 89 05:17:17 -0400 (EDT) Subject: SPACE Digest V9 #518 SPACE Digest Volume 9 : Issue 518 Today's Topics: Final Frontier Summary N2,V1 Shuttle Status for 06/26/89 (Forwarded) Re: Satellite Images - at home! Re: Space station computers Final Frontier Summary N4,V1 Final Frontier Summary V2,N2 ---------------------------------------------------------------------- Date: 27 Jun 89 01:15:52 GMT From: beowulf!riley@sdcsvax.ucsd.edu (Chris Riley) Subject: Final Frontier Summary N2,V1 Final Frontier, June 1988, Vol 1, No 2. Final Frontier is published bi-monthly: Address: FF, P.O. Box 20089, Minneapolis, MN 55420-9829. $14.95 per year. [I have no connection with FF except as a reader.] "The Observatory: The Space Settlement Act" by Congressman George E. Brown Jr. -D Space Settlements should be considered a benchmark for progress in space. Wants to ammend the National Aeronautics and Space Act of 1958 to set the establishment of space settlements as a long-term mission for the space agency. "Global Currents: Australia's Bid for Space Business" by Les Dorr, Jr. The Cape York International Spaceport is a proposed spaceport to catapult Australia into the 21st Century. "The Private Vector: Promises, Promises" by Melinda Gipson. More about President Reagan's new national space policy and its effects on private industry. Co's: Orbital Science Corp. "SOLO" by Alcestis R. Oberg A solitary human in orbit using the MMU is a chilling experience in more than one way. Some nice pictures of the MMUs are also included. "Growing Pains" by Michael Leccese The National Space Society is the result of the merger of the L5 and NSI groups, resulting in the second largest space groups. "The Five Rocket Garage" by Robert G. Nichols Bob Traux, a retired Navy captain and an 'important pioneer in the field -- working on Polaris, Atlas, and Thor programs-- talks about his plans to build a rocket company from his garage. He wants to make a big, simple booster and possibly use a water launch. Currently in the middle phase of building a small test vehicle: 25 feet in length. "Digging in on the Moon" by Maura J. Mackowski The first settlers on the moon could be living in 'homes' made from burrowing into the lunar topsoil or using recylced shuttle or space station parts. "The Stars Come Out for Space" by Tony Reichhardt Public service spots feature a bunch of stars who are 'opposites' of each other or do not usually agree on much, plugging the space program. "Japan's JEM of an Idea" by Gary Stephenson and Greg Freiherr The Japanese Experiment Module will provide an environment to continue and build upon experiments conducted using the shuttle. This is a nice discussion of the uses and plans for JEM. The Japan H-1 and H-2 rockets are also discussed. "Is Anybody Listening?" by Linda Billings James Fletcher of NASA says the most important space project in the US over the next few decades could be SETI. "R.S.V.P. - A Story" by Robert Nozick A story about SETI. Insert giving the size of internationl space launchers: US, ESA, Japan, USSR, China, India. "Mission to Phobos" by Charles R. Pellegrino Two Soviet probes will be launched towards Phobos this July to study this Marsian moon. A description of the mission is included and they also discuss whether or not the Soviets will be the first people on Mars. "Earthly Pursuits: Sweet Success" by Beth Dickey Heat pipes used to cool satilites are being used on earth to lower heat bills. Talks about the savings at one warehouse as a result. "Boundaries: Supercomputing the Cosmos" by Greg Freiherr The Hubble Space Telescope will see light that has taken 5 billion years to reach earth, but will not see the edge of the universe. Increasingly simulations are being run on computers to see how galaxies were formed, thereby seeing 'farther' than HST. ------------------------------------------------------------------- Chris Riley riley@cs.ucsd.edu "From the moment the first flint was flaked, this landing was merely a matter of time." --W.H. Auden, "Moon Landing" 1969 ------------------------------------------------------------------- ------------------------------ Date: 26 Jun 89 14:52:11 GMT From: trident.arc.nasa.gov!yee@ames.arc.nasa.gov (Peter E. Yee) Subject: Shuttle Status for 06/26/89 (Forwarded) KSC SPACE SHUTTLE PROCESSING REPORT - MONDAY, JUNE 26, 1989 STS-28 - COLUMBIA (OV 102) - OPF BAY 1 Columbia's payload bay doors were closed early Saturday morning. Technicians are closing out the elevon flipper doors today in preparation for a frequency response test of the orbiter's aerosurfaces. Later in the week, the orbiter's vent doors and external tank doors will be positioned for the rollover and the doors will be put on the aft compartment. Structural leak checks of the vehicle are also planned this week. Technicians are continuing to bond thermal blankets on the payload bay doors. One of the finishing touches includes painting the name Columbia on the left and right forward fusleage under the windows. This activity is scheduled this week. Columbia's target date for tow to the Vehicle Assembly Building is no earlier than June 30. The date is being assessed and depends on when the payload bay is actually closed for the move. While in the VAB, Columbia will be mated with its external tank and solid rocket boosters. STS-34 - ATLANTIS (OV 104) - OPF BAY 2 Tires for the main landing gear are scheduled to be installed today. This past weekend, the right orbital maneuvering system pod was installed and electrically mated to the orbiter. The left orbital maneuvering system pod will be removed next month for a period of about three weeks to allow work to prepare it for the next mission. Coolant lines have been installed for the radioisotope thermoelectric generators (RTGs), used to power the Galileo spacecraft, and leak checks of the lines this week. Orbiter systems will be tested this week. STS-33 - DISCOVERY (OV 103) - OMRF Power down work and modifications continue this week in the forward, mid and aft sections of the orbiter. Discovery will be transferred to bay 1 shortly after Columbia is moved to the VAB. STS-28 SOLID ROCKET BOOSTERS - VAB Closeouts of the boosters and tank are underway in preparation for mating with the orbiter Columbia. STS-34 SOLID ROCKET BOOSTERS - VAB/RPSF Workers attached the left forward segment last weekend. The right aft booster was transferred to the VAB this morning for mating inspections. Meanwhile, technicians are readying other STS-34 segments in the RPSF. ------------------------------ Date: 26 Jun 89 15:47:15 GMT From: jarvis.csri.toronto.edu!utgpu!utzoo!henry@rutgers.edu (Henry Spencer) Subject: Re: Satellite Images - at home! In article <931@sering.cwi.nl> fmr@cwi.nl (Frank Rahmani) writes: >There was a posting very recently on the net (schematics and software) >that used an average Atari computer to receive satpics. Please, folks, if you post something like this, give a more specific reference than "on the net". -- NASA is to spaceflight as the | Henry Spencer at U of Toronto Zoology US government is to freedom. | uunet!attcan!utzoo!henry henry@zoo.toronto.edu ------------------------------ Date: Mon, 26 Jun 1989 13:32-EDT From: Dale.Amon@H.GP.CS.CMU.EDU Subject: Re: Space station computers > would have designed for 64-256M. Sure, no equivalent system has that now, > but they will then. They're probably designing a 10Mhz bus too, when > there Not entirely true. The first generation NeXT machine comes standard with 8Meg and is designed such that the next generation of chips can be popped in as soon as available. The current machines, as delivered are thus CAPABLE of containing 64M of main memory WITHOUT add on cards. It has a 256M R/W removable optic disk and optional 600 or 300M winchester, all in a 1 ft cube. The specs of the existing NeXT machines, let alone the next NeXT, make the specs I've heard for the proposed space station machine obsolete in 1990, let alone in 1998. The specs I've heard here sound like what you'll see in toys for tots in 1998, NOT in a REAL computer. If you want a sophisticated machine for 1998, and you REALLY MUST roll your own, then do something real instead of spending many millions for a museum piece. I'd suggest you look at: - minimum resolution on screen of 300 dpi (400 would be nicer) with ~32 bits per pixel to handle color, intensity and transparency. (this is difficult but that kind of color is coming for million pixel displays. I expect there will be a drive for even higher resolution displays as archiving becomes an important use of machines) - a 100% object oriented interface using a combination of gesture sensing and voice for primary input. Keyboard will still be necessary for many things though. (some very good work in this area in the very lab I work in) - full spoken language translation capability between all langauges of space faring nations. (ie build on the work the japanese have already done. If IBM can't handle it, buy the consumer market translators that will be coming out of Nippon in a couple years.) - the machine should be able to identify people by voice and image, even with multiple individuals speaking or in the image. (difficult, but with systolic arrays and sphinx...) - an ISDN optical bus between all machines. (so you can use off the shelf communications equipment) - all digital communications, including digital TV. All data collections stored and processed digitally. - loads of DSP chips and other standard special purpose processors. I expect off the shelf Systolic Array Processors to be common by then for perceptual analysis tasks. - all software and hardware to conform to existing commercial and international standards. - PostScript or similar document image transmission language. - X.25 or TCP/IP protocols, or at least something in the ISO OSI lineage. - etc. - 256MB or more main memory with a bus that can support sizes deep into the gigabyte or even terrabyte range. (64MB personal computers are > 1 yr away now. This is conservative.) - Terrabyte R/W removal optic disks (I understand that 512MB units are already available) - similar size winchesters drives unless the OD's speeds can be projected to be competitive with the whinny's. (not much of an increase considering that 600MB is off the shelf and fairly cheap right now) I'm sure the rest of you can fill in more of the expected capabilities for a machine of 1998. I expect much of the above to be available significantly before hand. ------------------------------ Date: 27 Jun 89 01:18:28 GMT From: beowulf!riley@sdcsvax.ucsd.edu (Chris Riley) Subject: Final Frontier Summary N4,V1 Final Frontier, Oct 1988, Vol 1, No 4. Final Frontier is published bi-monthly: Address: FF, P.O. Box 20089, Minneapolis, MN 55420-9829. $14.95 per year. [I have no connection with FF except as a reader.] "The Observatory: The Next President on the Next Frontier" by Vice President George Bush and Governor Michael Dukakis The candidate's positions on space policy. "Global Currents: An Insider's Look at U.S.-Soviet Space Cooperation" by Les Dorr, Jr. "The Private Vector: Will a Space Superfund Fly?" by Melinda Gipson Every dollar spent on space returns seven dollars of economic value over the next decade and Rep Robert Roe (D) wants to form a superfund a la the highway trust fund for space. "Space, Politics and the Next President: Why you won't get to vote for Mars in '88" by Walter A. McDougall "The World's Highest Rollercoaster" by Ray Spangenburg and Diane Moser A ride in NASA's zero-gravity Learjet. "A Day on Miranda" by Charles R. Pellegrino Uranus's moon Miranda is 'one of the strangest bodies in the Solar System.' "Ten Years After" by Alcestis R. Oberg Where are the members of NASA's class of '78 "The Big Three Open Shop" by Thomas O'Toole As a result of Challenger, McDonnell Douglas, General Dynamics, and Martin Marietta are now producing Delta, Atlas, and Titan after scrapping their plans to close their production lines. "NASA's little Acre" by Beth Dickey. Space travelers can't rely on taking all their food with them and must plan on growing their own. Some of the current research is discussed along with what is being planned. "Antimatter Gets Serious" by Joel Davis How antimatter can open up the solar system and antimatter costs. Insert on the Highlights of NASA's first 30 years. "Earthly Pursuits: A Spinoff Hall of Fame" by Gary R. Graf "Spacefarers: Rockdonnel, Vulture, and Grumbo." by Norman Sklarewitz JPL's "SpaceSet '88". "Boundaries: The Star Most Likely to..." by Tony Reichhardt ...have planets: Beta Pictoris ------------------------------------------------------------------- Chris Riley riley@cs.ucsd.edu "From the moment the first flint was flaked, this landing was merely a matter of time." --W.H. Auden, "Moon Landing" 1969 ------------------------------------------------------------------- ------------------------------ Date: 27 Jun 89 01:21:13 GMT From: beowulf!riley@sdcsvax.ucsd.edu (Chris Riley) Subject: Final Frontier Summary V2,N2 Final Frontier, April 1989, Vol 2, No 2. Final Frontier is published bi-monthly: Address: FF, P.O. Box 20089, Minneapolis, MN 55420-9829. $14.95 per year. [I have no connection with FF except as a reader.] "The Observatory: Dear Mr. Bush" by Charles D. Walker. What must President Bush do to provide leadership for the space program. "Global Currents: Inside Star City" by Devera Pine Inside the Soviets main space training facility: 'Zvezdniy Gorodok'. "The Private Vector" Several brief articles on private space projects: * Space business warnings * Lockheed is willing to spend $50 million to convert Poseidon missiles into useful ground based rockets if it can line up customers. * Microgravity experiments on Mir may require a seperate module * Martin Marietta's plan to use an empty shuttle fuel tank to shield the proposed Gamma Ray Imaging Telescope from space debris. * Pikes Peak chapter of the National Space Society started their own rocket company to build a sub-orbital booster: Hummingbird Launch Systems. * The US Government should pay attention to the Space Foundation to stimulate commercial spending. * Boeing Aerospace analyzing craters to reconstruct the history of the solar system. "Backyard Universe:So you want to buy a Telescope" by Blaine P. Friedlander, Jr. "Boundaries: Small World" by T.A. Heppenheimer Nanotechnology and space. "Next Stop, Phobos" by Vyacheslav Kovtunenko About Phobos 1 and Phobos 2 by the technical director for the Phobos project. "Roads to Mars" by Tony Reichhardt Yet another article on what kind of planning is needed to go to Mars. "Being There" by Robert M. Powers The goal once we reach Mars should be to stay at least for a while, possibly to produce the fuel for the return trip on Mars. "In Earth's Image" by Alcestis R. Oberg Terraforming of planets in the solar system "The China Syndrome" by Thomas O'Toole China's Long March carrying commercial satellites into orbit. Insert on STS-27. As much coverage as was allowed of this classified launch. Also, a list of shuttle launch dates and crew assignments into early 1990. "A Fight for Freedom" by Paul Hoversten Selling the space station to Congress. "Spacefarers: A Declaration for Mars" by Eric W. Tilenius More about the Mars Declaration being circulated by The Planetary Society. "Mr. van den Berg Goes to Space" by Vic Cox Astronaut Lodewijk van den Berg discusses his mission with Spacelab 3 in the spring of 1985. ------------------------------------------------------------------- Chris Riley riley@cs.ucsd.edu "From the moment the first flint was flaked, this landing was merely a matter of time." --W.H. Auden, "Moon Landing" 1969 ------------------------------------------------------------------- ------------------------------ End of SPACE Digest V9 #518 *******************