Space & Astronomy/Space and Astronomy (October 1993).iso/mac/TEXT/DAILY_1/930123.DFC

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22-Jan-93 Daily File Collection
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=--=--=START=--=--= NASA Spacelink File Name:930122.SHU

KSC SHUTTLE STATUS 1/22/93

              SPACE SHUTTLE WEEKLY STATUS SUMMARY
                   Friday, January 22, 1993



George H. Diller
Kennedy Space Center


Vehicle: OV-102/Orbiter Columbia
Current location: OPF Bay 2
Mission: STS-55/Spacelab-D2         Inclination: 28.45 degrees Launch
timeframe: February, wk 4    Nominal Landing Site: KSC Mission Duration: 8
days 22 hours   Crew size: 7


STS-55 IN WORK:

- external tank door test cycles
- orbiter aft main engine compartment closeouts
- reaction control system trickle purge
- routine thermal protection system tile work
STS-55 WORK SCHEDULED:
- avionics bay closeout on Saturday
- astronaut Crew Equipment Interface Test (CEIT) on Sunday
- main propulsion system closeouts
- aft structural leak check
- orbiter composite pressurization test
- tile closeouts
- Ku-band antenna testing
- stow Ku-band antenna for flight
- rollover to the VAB first week of February
- external tank/solid rocket booster closeouts in the VAB
STS-55 WORK COMPLETED:
- ammonia boiler servicing
- water spray boiler servicing
- installation of Spacelab tunnel
- Spacelab Interface Verification Test (IVT)
Vehicle: OV-103/Discovery   Mission Number: STS-56
Location: OPF Bay 3
Payloads: ATLAS-2/ODERACS/SSBUV/SPARTAN/SUVE
Launch timeframe: March, wk 4   Crew Size: 5
Mission Duration: 8 days   Inclination: 57 degrees
Nominal Landing Site: KSC
STS-56 IN WORK:
- preparations for left OMS pod removal
- connections of waste containment system
- Ku-band antenna testing
- stacking solid rocket boosters in the VAB
- main propulsion system functional testing
STS-56 WORK COMPLETED:
- head-up display system checkout
- tests of S-band air-to-ground antenna
- auxiliary power unit leak and functional checks
STS-56 DISCOVERY WORK SCHEDULED:
- main engine installation
- right OMS pod functional
- forward reaction control system installation
- solid rocket booster stacking continues
- Ku-band antenna testing continues
- potable water servicing
- drag chute installation
- crew hatch seal leak check
- testing of flight deck data display systems
- auxiliary power unit lube oil servicing
STS-57 ENDEAVOUR
IN WORK:
- preparations to open payload bay doors
- ordnance safing
- preparations for hypergolic deservicing
- tile waterproofing for next mission
- installation of window covers
- dump of flight data recorders
STS-57 ENDEAVOUR WORK SCHEDULED:
- open payload bay doors
- post flight mechanical inspections
- waste containment system functional check
- drag chute hardware removal
- wheel and tire removal
- TACAN post-flight checkout
- preparations for DXS and IUS airborne support equipment removal
Source:NASA Spacelink    Modem:205-895-0028  Internet:192.149.89.61 =--=--=-
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=--=--=START=--=--= NASA Spacelink File Name:930122.SKD
DAILY NEWS/TV SKED 1/22/93
Daily News
Friday, January 22, 1993
Two Independence Square,
Washington, D.C.
Audio service: 202/358-3014
 % KSC team continues orbiter flow for late February launch of Columbia;  %
Two German payload specialists will fly on STS-55 Spacelab D-2 mission;  %
Berkeley science team reports initial all sky survey completed in
ultraviolet;
 % Visitor and Exhibit activities continue at brisk pace at Marshall, Stennis.
* * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *
Activity at the Kennedy Space Center is at a normal, two- shift-a-day, level
as the Orbiter Processing Facility crew working on Columbia for its upcoming
STS-55 Spacelab D-2 flight continue to prepare that vehicle for the mission.
A minor problem encountered last week with Columbia's payload bay door latches
may have been resolved as engineers there reported they found some anomalies
with Columbia's shear pins.  Because of the effort to track the payload bay
door problem, the team is about three days behind their nominal flow schedule,
though they are still aiming for a late February launch.
The STS-55 mission is a dedicated German research flight, as was the D-1
mission which flew on STS-61A in November 1985.  The flight is scheduled as an
8-day and 22-hour, seven-crewmember mission with the Spacelab long module and
a variety of scientific discipline investigations.  This mission's major
Spacelab facilities will continue the exploration of fluid physics and human
physiological changes in microgravity.  Additional experiments will continue
the investigations of the Earth's atmosphere, the surface topography of the
planet, and additional investigations in galactic astronomy and technology
development.
The mission will also feature the flight of two German payload specialists and
will provide both the U.S. and German crewmembers with daily opportunities to
communicate with Earth-bound citizens in both countries through the Shuttle
Amateur Radio Experiment gear, which is flying again on this mission. * * * *
* * * * * * * * * * * *
The 6-month all sky survey phase of the Extreme Ultraviolet Explorer has been
completed according to the principal investigator at the University of
California, Berkeley. The post survey calibration on target stars is currently
underway.  The EUVE Guest Observer program will begin next week with
observations of the planet Mars. During the first six months of the Guest
Observer phase, the few gaps which remain in the all sky survey will also be
filled in.
The EUVE experiment team at UC Berkeley reports the observatory continues to
operate exceptionally well.  EUVE was launched on June 12, 1992, aboard a
Delta launcher from the Cape Canaveral Air Force Station.
* * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *
Officials at the Stennis Space Center report that they hosted over 1,400
visitors last week, representing visitors from 35 states and 12 foreign
nations.  The center also reports they described center activities and NASA
programs to about 400 members of the Downtown Rotary Club in Jackson,
Mississippi.
* * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *
Marshall Space Flight Center officials report they have set up their exhibit
on "Why America Explores Space" at the Boston-hosted symposium of the Yankee
Dental Conference. This 3-day conference will be attended by more than 22,000
members of the New England dental community and their families, providing an
excellent opportunity for the Marshall team to reach a large and influential
group of professionals.  Marshall also reports very high attendance of their
Space Station Freedom trailers, which were set up on display on the Mall in
Washington during four days of last weeks' Inaugural activities.  The Marshall
team also reports they are exploring exhibit possibilities at this year's
American Association for the Advancement of Science annual meeting, which will
be held in Boston from February 11 through 16.
Here's the broadcast schedule for Public Affairs events on NASA Select TV.
Note that all events and times may change without notice, and that all times
listed are Eastern. Live indicates a program is transmitted live.
Friday, January 22, 1993
Live
12:00 pm  NASA Today news program.
12:15 pm  Aeronautics & Space Report.
12:30 pm  Remarkable Flying Machine.
 1:00 pm  Flying Machines.
 1:30 pm  Our Violent Universe.
 2:00 pm  Starfinder program #5.
 2:30 pm  Life in the Universe.
 3:00 pm  Total Quality Management program #28 from
          the University of New Mexico series.
 at 4:00 and 8:00 pm and 12:00 midnight the broadcast
          schedule of the day repeats.
NASA Select TV is carried on GE Satcom F2R, transponder 13, C-Band, 72 degrees
West Longitude, transponder frequency is 3960 MegaHertz, audio subcarrier is
6.8 MHz, polarization is vertical.
     Source:NASA Spacelink    Modem:205-895-0028  Internet:192.149.89.61 =--=-
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=--=--=START=--=--= NASA Spacelink File Name:5_12_3.TXT

                    P R O J E C T     V I K I N G



Viking I                                Viking II
Launched:          Aug   20, 1975       Launched:          Sept 09, 1975
Martian Orbit:     July  19, 1976       Martian Orbit:     Aug  07, 1976
Martian Landing:   July  20, 1976       Martian Landing:   Sept 03, 1976 Last
Transmission: Nov   11, 1982       Last Transmission: Apr  11, 1980 The United
States carried its Bicentennial banner 400 million miles through space to make
scientific history.
On July 20, 1976, the Viking I lander established Earth's first science
outpost on the surface of Mars. A month and a half later, on September 03, the
companion spacecraft, Viking II, successfully placed its lander 7,400
kilometers (4,600 miles) away.
The orbiter positions of the two-part Viking I and II spacecraft continued
circling the Red Planet, studying and photographing it from orbit and relaying
data and messages between the two landers and Earth.
Was or is there life on Mars? The big question defied answer. The
sophisticated biological laboratories of the two Viking landers produced
neither a flat, disappointing "no" nor the hoped-for, dramatic "yes."
The two types of life tests designed to detect gases produced in metabolism
initially showed vigorous activity suggestive of life processes such as are
known on Earth. A third type, designed to detect organic materials, was
negative, however; these developments compelled scientists to look for
plausible non-biological explanations.
The puzzling results could be due to exotic chemistry, possibly a highly-
oxidizing Martian soil that is unlike Earth soil because of the heavy
bombardment of Mars by solar ultraviolet radiation and electrified atomic
particles in solar wind.

Besides the search of life, Viking conducted the most detailed scientific
investigation of a planet ever made by an unmanned craft. Among the findings
are the following:
o  The Martian atmosphere was found to have all the elements needed to
support life. Viking I discovered nitrogen--essential to life as    we know
it. Nitrogen accounted for 2% to 3% of the Martian    atmosphere. Other
atmospheric gases and their concentrations were:    carbon dioxide, 96.2%,
argon-40, 1% to 2% and oxgyen, 0.1% to 0.4%.
o  That ratio of argon-36 to argon-40 was determined, and from it
scientists theorized that the Martian atmospheric pressure near the    surface
may have been 10 to 100 times higher than it is now. Such    an atmosphere
would have permitted the existence of liquid water.    (In Mars' present
atmosphere, only 1% as dense as that of Earth,    liquid water would instantly
vaporize. Viking orbiter photographs    confirmed that considerable water once
flowed over the Martian    surface.) Traces of two rare gases, krypton and
xenon, also were    detected in the atmosphere by the Viking II lander.

o  The brightness of the Martian sky, with its thin atmosphere,    surprised
some scientists as did the color: pink. The color was    attributed to the
scattering and reflection of sunlight from    reddish particles adrift in the
lower atmosphere. The Martian    surface has a veneer of orangy-red material
covering darker    bedrock. The surface redness is believed due to the
oxidation of    iron-rich soil.

o  Iron, calcium, silicon, titanium, aluminum, sulfur and chlorine    were
among the inorganic elements detected in the soil by Viking    landers. This
content is somewhat like that of desert soils on    Earth. However, about 16%
of the Martian soil is iron, equivalent    to the most iron-rich soils of
Earth.

o  The sulfur and chlorine detected by Viking I suggest the presence    at one
time of sulfide and chloride salts. They could have been    left behind when
subsurface Martian permafrost melted and quickly    evaporated due to the thin
atmosphere.

o  Trace elements, such as rubidium, strontium, and ziconium, usually    found
in Earth samples, were present in comparatively low    concentrations or not
at all in the Viking soil samples. The lack    of trace elements indicates
that the rocks around the lander are    more primitive than those on the
Earth.


 ---------------
THIS IS NASA, August 1978, Information Sheet 78-2
     Source:NASA Spacelink    Modem:205-895-0028  Internet:192.149.89.61
=--=--=-END-=--=--=

=--=--=START=--=--= NASA Spacelink File Name:6_14_6_2.TXT
NASA HIGH RESOLUTION MICROWAVE SURVEY (HRMS)
TARGETED SEARCH AND SKY SURVEY STATUS
INAUGURATION  +  60 DAYS
BACKGROUND

The High Resolution Microwave Survey (HRMS) is part of the Toward Other
Planetary Systems (TOPS) program in NASA's Solar System Exploration Division.
The HRMS looks for evidence of planets orbiting other stars through radio
emissions that may be produced by technological civilizations on any such
planets.  The HRMS has two search modes, a Sky Survey and a Targeted Search.
The Sky Survey, managed by the Jet Propulsion Laboratory, uses 34-meter
antennas in NASA's Deep Space Network to sweep the entire sky over a wide
range of frequencies for the presence of strong signals.  The Targeted Search
uses the largest available radio telescopes to observe nearby sun-like stars
over a narrower range of frequencies for weak signals.  The Targeted Search is
managed by NASA's Ames Research Center which is also the lead center for the
HRMS. The combination of the two search modes is millions of times more
comprehensive than the sum of all previous search programs.  The observational
phase of the HRMS was inaugurated at 1900 hours Universal Time on 12 October
1992, Columbus Day, at the NASA Goldstone Deep Space Communications Complex in
California and the Arecibo Observatory in Puerto Rico. The Arecibo Observatory
is part of the National Astronomy and Ionosphere Center, operated by Cornell
University for the National Science Foundation. In a coordinated program, the
Arecibo antenna pointed at the star GL615.1A and the Goldstone antenna began
to scan a small area of sky that included the position of the target star.
The beginning of the search generated world-wide interest in the media.  This
report presents an overview of the observations and results to date.

INAUGURAL OBSERVATIONS

Sky Survey
Initial observations began with the new 34-meter antenna at the Venus
Development Station at Goldstone. The project is using the available X-Band
receiver which can be tuned from 8200 to 8600 MHz, and the Sky Survey
Prototype System (SSPS).  The SSPS divides 40 MHz of the spectrum into two
million 20JHz channels and automatically looks for Continuous Wave signals as
the search progresses.  Each observation involves driving the antenna rapidly
in a "sliding racetrack" pattern programmed to cover a "sky frame," a
rectangular area of sky approximately 1 degree high and 30 degrees in length.

While observing, the SSPS temporarily stores data from channels with power
above a specified threshold level and excises data from channels affected by
terrestrial signals.  The scan pattern is designed so that each point in the
frame will be scanned by the antenna at least twice (with slightly different
offsets) at times separated by about 10 minutes.  Candidate signals drawn from
the temporary buffer are selected for verification tests at the completion of
the sky frame.  A total of 17 sky frames, including 4 repeat frames, have been
observed at X-Band. To date, no candidates have passed the verification tests
and the results are entirely consistent with the expected thermal noise
statistics.  Through January 1993, the SSPS will continue to observe about one
day per week on the 34-meter antenna at Goldstone with an increase in
allocated time later in the year.
A special set of three sky frames covering parts of the galactic plane were
observed repeatedly in the frequency bands 1600-1750 MHz and 1380-1430 MHz.
These observations, using the available L-Band receiver on the 26-meter
antenna at the Venus site, are designed to optimize radio astronomy data and
improve interference excision algorithms.
Targeted Search

The Targeted Search System (TSS) used the 305-meter antenna of the Arecibo
Observatory, the world's largest, for its initial observations.  The TSS
processed a 10 MHz bandwidth into more than 14 million channels
simultaneously, producing parallel channel resolutions ranging from 1 Hz to 28
Hz.  Data were analyzed in real-time for the presence of Continuous Wave (CW)
and Pulsed signals that may drift in frequency by as much as 1 Hz per second.
Observations focused on a list of 25 stars within 100 light years.  Receivers
provided by the observatory allowed observations in four frequency bands
covering a total of about 300 MHz within the range from 1300 MHz to 2400 MHz.
Each "observation" of a star in a particular frequency band consisted of three
steps with the antenna first pointed at the star, then away from the star, and
then back at the star.  Each observing step lasted either 92 seconds or 299
seconds.  Signals that were present only when the telescope was pointed at the
star were considered potentially of extraterrestrial origin and were subjected
to further tests.  Signals that were present both "on" and "off" the star were
deemed to be terrestrial interference signals.  A total of 436 observations
were conducted during the 200 hours of assigned telescope time.  A large
number of interference signals were detected and cataloged.  Fifteen signals
required further verification tests but all proved to be intermittent
terrestrial signals.

Since returning from Arecibo, the TSS is being reassembled in the TS
development lab at NASA Ames. As expected, operational experience has
indicated the need for modifications to several circuit boards and
improvements to the control software.  Over the next year the capability of
the system will also be doubled to cover 20 MHz.  This work is in preparation
for observations of nearby sun-like stars in the Southern Hemisphere,
scheduled to begin in 1994 at the 64-meter antenna of the Parkes Observatory
in Australia. Parkes is part of the Australian Telescope National Facility
operated by the Commonwealth Scientific Industrial Research Organization.
Analysis of the data collected at Arecibo is now under way with the goal of
developing better techniques for quickly identifying, classifying, and perhaps
even avoiding interference signals.

RESULTS

No signals from beyond our Solar System have been detected yet.  Although many
signals have been detected, none appear to originate from a point on the sky
as determined by our observation and verification strategies.  Most of the
signals were recognized immediately as terrestrial interference by the
software.  A few observations and sky frames detected signals that required
verification tests. Nearly all verification tests have been performed at the
site within minutes of the original detection.  A few tests had to be
performed on the following day. No signal passed this level of testing.
The HRMS has successfully inaugurated its observational phase.  Both the
Targeted Search and the Sky Survey are using the lessons learned in the
initial observations to improve the hardware, software, and observation
techniques of the HRMS project.
For more information, please contact:

SETI Office
NASA Ames Research Center
M.S. 244-11
Moffett Field, CA  94035-1000