Space & Astronomy/Space and Astronomy (October 1993).iso/mac/TEXT/SPACEDIG/V11_4/V11_477.TXT

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Subject: SPACE Digest V11 #477

SPACE Digest                                     Volume 11 : Issue 477

----------------------------------------------------------------------
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Today's Topics:
             Re: Soviet Missions to Mars
               Variable star R. Leonis
          Re: Saturn V:  Center S-I Engine shutdown?
               Re: Galileo entry probe
               Re: Naming Stars
             Re: Shuttle centaur
         CALL FOR VOTES: comp.lang.idl-pvwave
               Re: Naming Stars
                  Radiation
               Cosmology texts
          Re: space news from April 2 AW&ST
----------------------------------------------------------------------

Date: 1 Jun 90 07:39:16 GMT
From: mcsun!hp4nl!nikhefh![e-mail]  (Greg Retzlaff)
Subject: Re: Soviet Missions to Mars

In article <1990May31.040347.29182@uunet!unhd> [e-mail] (Robert M. Kenney) writes:
>
>    What ever happened to the idea of a network link to the USSR?  Seems
>   like the scope of this group(and others) could be improved by getting
>   interaction with our Soviet counterparts.  It'd be nice to get launch
>   schedules and other messages from them like we do from our friends at
>   JPL.  Whatever happened to that slow news link somebody said he was setting
>   up(~ 3 years ago...)?
>
I am collaborating with some Russian scientists at this time.  They
indeed have a way to log into a computer here to get and send computer
mail.  However, a group of about 5 is limited to about 2 hours of connect
time per MONTH out of the USSR.  Many other groups cannot send or
receive BITNET mail at all.  International telephone calls must be booked 1
day in advance.  They are not NEARLY as advantaged as us; we
have much to be thankful for.  The least of their worries is to use their
very meagre communications resources for such relatively flippant (though to us
very interesting) purposes.

Hope this helps,
Greg Retzlaff
NIKHEF-K
Amsterdam
--
Greg Retzlaff, NIKHEF-K
Netherlands Institute for Nuclear and Particle Physics
The most common things in the universe  | We are all in the gutter,
are hydrogen and stupidity.             | but some of us look at the stars.

------------------------------

Date: 1 Jun 90 13:10:14 GMT
From: philmtl![e-mail]  (Grant Bonnell)
Subject: Variable star R. Leonis

I have been watching the variable star R. Leonis for the past two
months from my light polluted backyard in Montreal, just to beef up
my skills until I move the the country and dark skys where I can begin
a serious program of variable star observing.  Recently, however, with
R. Leonis getting lower on the horizon each night, and with the variable
itself becoming fainter, I am no longer so certain of my magnitude
estimates.  On June 1 at 2:30 UT I estimated the brightness of R. Leonis
at aproximately 8.2.  Can any variable star observer out there tell me
how accurate this estimate is?  I would appreciate some feedback so
I can get a feel for what kind of mistakes I am making.


Grant Bonnell - Philips Electronics - Montreal

------------------------------

Date: 1 Jun 90 18:01:35 GMT
From: shlump.nac.dec.com![e-mail]  (Gary Hughes - VMS Development)
Subject: Re: Saturn V:  Center S-I Engine shutdown?

The center F-1 was shutdown late in the S-1C burn to keep G forces below
acceptable limits as the propellant was depleted. For the same reason, the
central J-2 on the S-II was shutdown early.

I wasn't aware of this until watching the rerun of network coverage of
Apollo 11 on A&E. It came up in an interview with one of the astronauts, and
was again mentioned in a 4 part documentary on Apollo 11 from NASA.

gary
hughes @star.dec.com

------------------------------

Date: 7 May 90 23:15:48 GMT
From: skipper![e-mail]  (Mary Shafer)
Subject: Re: Galileo entry probe

In article <[e-mail]> [e-mail] (Al Bowers) writes:

   In article <[e-mail]> [e-mail] (Jay Glass) writes:

   >Incidentally, I couldn't find Mary Shafer *anywhere* Sunday morning...when
   >asked where the Usenet RDV was, her boss looked blank...

   Mary is out for a few days.  Travel or something and she won't have
   net access until she gets back.  Just thought I'd let you know...

I was TDY at Langley Research Center last week evaluating cockpit
displays and information systems for air combat.  We were using the
Differential Maneuvering Simulator.  Nothing like a little death in
the air....  Of course, I got shot down on both runs, but the real
pilots did a lot better.

Now, about the Shuttle landing and the Usenet RDV--I was there at 0715
(25 minutes after landing) for about an hour.  Paul Raveling, Gene
Miya, and a host of other Usenet people managed to make the RDV.  You
couldn't have missed me in my bright red dress, surrounded by the
raucous group.  Did you get there too early?  (BTW, Al wasn't even
here--we looked, but couldn't find him.)  Too bad you weren't there, I
gave away my STS-31 Press Kit, some PR handouts, and some posters.

They tell me that the next flight with the ramp ("official guest")
operation is STS-40, with a target launch date of 29 August.  Maybe
Steve Jay can finally make it?  Maybe we can all get together?  We'll
have to work on it!

--
Mary Shafer  [e-mail]  ames!skipper.dfrf.nasa.gov!shafer
         NASA Ames Dryden Flight Research Facility, Edwards, CA
                   Of course I don't speak for NASA

------------------------------

Date: 1 Jun 90 18:39:28 GMT
From: stsci![e-mail]  (Zoltan Levay)
Subject: Re: Naming Stars

In article <[e-mail]>, [e-mail] writes:
> Who cares I mean who want's to call a STAR something,Don't you
> know, they call the stars M1,M2 and dumb names like that, why
> not anything imaginative e.g. Nostridamis, Abjenon,Causous.

Well, sure, you can name anything you want anything you want.  You
could call New York Harry if you want, but nobody would know what you
are talking about.

The idea behind "naming" celestial objects is a common point of
reference.  Most stars referenced by astronomers don't really have
names as much as a catalog number:  HD, SAO, BD, etc.  Many naked eye
stars do have nice ancient romantic (mostly Arabic) names such as
Aldebaran, Betelgeuse, or Zubenelgenubi.  Clusters, Galaxies and other
objects are usually named similarly, a numerical entry in some
catalog:  Messier, NGC, 3C, Abell, etc.  Comets usually get named after
the discoverer(s).

Many astronomical names are decided upon or agreed to by committee,
specifically various sections of the International Astronomical Union
(IAU).  Again, this is mostly so everyone knows what everyone else is
talking about.
--
Zolt

                             "f/8 and be there!"  Bill Garrett

------------------------------

Date: 1 Jun 90 21:16:38 GMT
From: mojo![e-mail]  (Doug Mohney)
Subject: Re: Shuttle centaur

In article <[e-mail]>, [e-mail] (Henry Spencer) writes:
>In-space refuelling is officially Too Difficult for some reason.  Also,

Too dangerous after the post-Challenger reassessment on safety. This kinda
screwed DoD, which had planned to refuel KH-12s in orbit.

------------------------------

Date: 2 Jun 90 00:37:01 GMT
From: caldwr![e-mail]  (Ralph Finch)
Subject: CALL FOR VOTES: comp.lang.idl-pvwave


CALL FOR VOTES: creation of comp.lang.idl-pvwave

This is to solict votes to create a group for a language called either
IDL or PV-Wave (depending on whom you buy it from).

Group Name:    comp.lang.idl-pvwave

Vote period:    Through June 22, 1990.

To vote: send mail to

[e-mail]    ---or---   ...ucbvax!ucdavis!caldwr!rfinch

Replying to this message should work.

Indicate clearly in the subject and/or message whether your vote is
YES or NO for creating comp.lang.idl-pvwave.  Qualified votes ("I vote
yes if...."), votes posted to a group, or unclear votes cannot be
counted.  I'll reply to each vote individually; a mass acknowledgment
will be made at the end.

Charter: An unmoderated newsgroup for discussing the programming
language known as both Interactive [Data/Display] Language (IDL) and
PV-Wave (Precision Visuals Workstation Analysis and Visualization
Environment).  Topics will be programming tips, techniques, and code
exchanges, either full programs or fragments.  The proposed group is
intended primarily to discuss numerical analysis, imaging, scientific
visualization, etc.  *as performed using the IDL/Wave language*; it is
not intended to support discussions concerning those topics directly,
as groups already exist for those purposes (e.g.
sci.math.num-analysis).

The existing group comp.lang.idl is for the Interface Description
Language, something else entirely.

This Call For Votes does not constitute an endorsement of any product
or company.


--
Ralph Finch            916-445-0088
[e-mail]        ...ucbvax!ucdavis!caldwr!rfinch
Any opinions expressed are my own; they do not represent the DWR

------------------------------

Date: 1 Jun 90 11:06:48 GMT
From: mcsun!unido!rwthinf![e-mail]  (Dieter Kreuer)
Subject: Re: Naming Stars

In article <[e-mail]>, [e-mail] writes:
> Who cares I mean who want's to call a STAR something,Don't you
> know, they call the stars M1,M2 and dumb names like that, why
> not anything imaginative e.g. Nostridamis, Abjenon,Causous.

There are quite *some* stars visible and it would be rather difficult to
find 20 million imaginative star names. And it is useful, that the identifi-
cation of the star contains the position of the object, the way it is done
in some star catalogs (don't quote me, I'm just an amateur), so you don't
need to look in huge catalogs to find the object.

As a matter of fact, the brightest stars do *have* names like 'Capella'
or 'Ras Alhague', and so do many planetoids whose names were in the beginning
related to ancient Greek or Roman mythology. But later, there were much more
planetoids discovered than Greek or Roman gods/godesses available.

The astronomical nomenclature sometimes uses strange rules, e.g. for
variable stars (the system was first proposed by German astronomer
Argelander, I don't have the exact reference now). The first variable
discovered in a constellation gets the name R <const.>, where <const.>
is a 3-letter-code indicating one of the 88 (right?) official constellation
names. The next variable is called S, then T through Z. The sequence continues
with RR, RS, ..., RZ, then SS (SA...SR left out), ST, ... SZ, TT, ..., ZZ. Now
we proceed with AA, AB, ..., AZ, then BB (BA left out), ..., QZ (all combi-
nations with J left out). This yields 334 combinations. The sequence then
proceeds with V334, V335, ... Believe it or not, although only a small per-
centage of all stars are variable, there are 'AR CAS'es and 'V426 CYG'es
because there are billions and/of billions (greetings to C. Sagan) of stars.
Certainly more stars than people on earth and hence more than existing names.

|==============================================================================
|  .     .   .    . _____    .     .   .   * .|  Dieter Kreuer                |
|   .    * .  .    /  O  \  .    + .       .  |  Lehrstuhl Informatik IV      |
|    . .   +.  *  |\ O O /|   .       *   .   |  RWTH Aachen                  |
|   ____________  | \___//| .  ____________   |  Ahornstr. 55                 |
|  /_/_/_/_/_/_/__| |___|/|___/_/_/_/_/_/_/ . |  D-5100 Aachen                |
| /_/_/_/_/_/_/ . | |___|/|  /_/_/_/_/_/_/    |  F.R.Germany                  |
|   .   .     .   \ |___|//.  .    +.   .     |                               |
|   .*    .        \|___|/      .   * :    .  |  Phone: [phone]        |
|       .    *  .   /.  \    .*  =============|  Fax:   [phone]        |
| .  +.   .    .   /   . \.   . /    E-Mail: [e-mail] |
|       .     .   /   .+  \.   /             [e-mail]              |
|==============================================================================

------------------------------

Date: 1 Jun 90 16:29:22 GMT
From: pmafire![e-mail]  (alan herbst)
Subject: Radiation


H. Peter [e-mail] questioned:
>How much protection would these rad-hard memories provide against single event
>upsets, & latch ups. ie., what sort of tolerance do they have against total
>accumulated radiation?

and

Henry [e-mail] stated:
>It *does* seem to be hard to find solid quantitative data on them:  it seems
>to appear only in obscure technical reports.  I too would be interested in
>any good references.

Referring to the June, 1987 catalog for Harris Semiconductor entitled
"RAD-HARD/HI-REL CICD DATA BOOK", the following data is offered
as examples:

4096 x 1 CMOS STATIC RAM (Harris HS-6504RH):
Total Dose .... 1 x E5 Rad
Data Upset .... >E8 Rad/s
Latch-Up Free . >1 x E12 Rad/s

2K x 8 CMOS PROM (Harris HS-6616RH):
Total Dose .... 1 x E5 Rad
Data Upset .... not given
Latch-up Free . >1 x E12 Rad/s

8085 8-bit CMOS Microprocessor (Harris HS-80C85RH):
Total Dose .... 1 x E5 Rad
Data Upset .... >1 x E8 Rad/s
Latch-up Free . >1 x E12 Rad/s

8086 16-bit CMOS Microprocessor (Harris HS-80C86RH):
Total Dose .... 1 x E5 Rad
Data Upset .... >E8 Rad/s
Latch-up Free . not given

Chapter 2 of the Harris Rad-Hard catalog titled, "Radiation Effects on
CMOS" presents sections on types of radiation, radiation effects,
radiation hardening, hardened device data, and appendices.  This
information along with the general information in Chapter 1 gives a
very good overview of radiation hardened electronics.  At the end of
Chapter 2 there are six references to IEEE papers on radiation effects
to electronics. In addition, Chapter 13 contains several article reprints
on radiation hardening.

To get a copy of the Harris catalog, contact Harris Semiconductor, 2401
Palm Bay Road, Palm Bay, Florida 32905, Telephone [phone].  Also
Hamilton/Avnet Corporation is listed as a distributor in the US and
Canada.

There is also a NASA report CR-1787 on radiation hardened chips.  I do
not have a copy of this so I can't report further on it.

Hope this may help, Alan
--
----------
Alan Herbst - WINCO Computer Engineering Group
208-526-3939, 0800 to 1615 MDT
Path: ..!{uunet|bigtex}!pmafire!alan}

------------------------------

Date: 1 Jun 90 10:04:15 GMT
From: agate!darkstar!ucscb.UCSC.EDU![e-mail]  (Ray Rischpater)
Subject: Cosmology texts

I was looking for some good introductory texts on cosmology I could consume
this summer.   I'm a chemistry major with a reasonable grasp on math and
introductory physics.

I'd be obliged if those of you with a favorite textbook which is a little
more detailed than the Cosmos-style pop science writing would mail me your
favorites.  If there's interest, I'll compile the results and post a follow-up.

Thank you for your time.


--     [e-mail]            Ray Rischpater
--     [e-mail]          [phone]
--
--     [e-mail]            Ray Rischpater
--     [e-mail]          [phone]
--As usual, all of the opinions contained herein are my own...

------------------------------

Date: 1 Jun 90 19:04:59 GMT
From: groucho![e-mail]  (Steve Emmerson)
Subject: Re: space news from April 2 AW&ST

In <[e-mail]> [e-mail] (Henry Spencer) writes:

>In fact it is *just barely* possible to climb Mount Everest - 29,000ft --
>without oxygen.  It's been done.  It's so marginal that it is possible
>only because Everest is near the equator:  the overall atmospheric
>circulation of Earth, warm rising air at the equator moving north and
>then falling near the poles, slightly increases atmospheric density
>at high altitude near the equator, just enough to make the peak of
>Everest reachable.

Bear in mind that the individual is _dying_ while doing this.  It's only
because the stay is temporary that survival is possible.

There are no permanent human habitations above 18,000 feet.

Steve Emmerson        [e-mail]        ...!ncar!unidata!steve

------------------------------

End of SPACE Digest V11 #477
*******************