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Subject: SPACE Digest V9 #329

SPACE Digest                                      Volume 9 : Issue 329

Today's Topics:
   Soviet Phobos II probe fails just before final approach to moon
           Soviet Satellite Photos for Sale
        Re: Success with cold fusion reported
        Re: Room Temperature fusion, expert skepticism
               Re: SPACE Digest V9 #321
               Re: NASA Select
             Re: Primordial Hydrocarbons
                Two questions.
        Re: Success with cold fusion reported
----------------------------------------------------------------------

Date: Sat, 1 Apr 89 00:51:21 EST
From: Glenn Chapman <[e-mail]>
To: [e-mail], [e-mail],
        [e-mail]
Subject: Soviet Phobos II probe fails just before final approach to moon

     On Mar. 29th the Soviet Union's Phobos II probe suffered a fatal
failure.  On Mar. 21st it had undergone the final maneuver, placing it in
synchronous orbit with the Martian moon.  On Mar. 26th pictures of Phobos
had been taken from about 150 Km (94 mi) from away. On the 27/28th a second
close up set was being taken.  This was to generate the final orbital
measurements to insure the close approach could be done about 1 week later.
On the Phobos probes the antenna system is not mounted on its own transport
platform (as is done on most US probes).  Instead the vehicle was commanded
to turn away, take the pictures, then return contact to Earth control.
However, in this case the probe rotated away, but never came back.
Compounding the problem of regaining command was the fact that it had
previously lost its main transponder, a 50 Watt system, and was now
operating on this 5 Watt backup.  Thus there are two main probable failure
points, the first being that the control system broke down thus leaving the
probe unable to get back to Earth alignment.  The other possibility is that
the transmitter died, and there was no backup left.  Electronic equipment
often fails just when it is turned on again, as would be the case with this
observation method (the 30 Megabit memory could hold 1100 picture sets so
there was no need to transmit these in real time).  It is not obvious which
problem occurred here though some reports say that faint signals were
received from Phobos II after this failure.  The NY Times quotes Nikotal
Simyonov as saying "it would be very difficult at this point to get a
response form the spacecraft".  The more time the craft is without earth
command the more likely it will loss the sun alignment for its solar cells,
thus suffering a power deficit also.
    Note that the mission was not a complete failure.  Even with the data
obtained at this point the probe has produced the "the highest quality
images of yet obtained of Phobos".  In addition at Mars itself the infrared
spectra give much compositionial information about the planet's surface and
atmosphere, while the planetary magnetic field has been measured.  Never
the less there is bitter loss at missing the Phobos landing by only a few
days. (Boston Globe and New York Times, Mar. 30)
    One comment here, the researchers at the Soviet IKI institute, which
were in charge of the probe, have been pushing the line that unmanned
systems are cheaper and more reliable than manned ones.  They have been
strongly suggesting that robots would be better to explore Mars rather than
a manned mission.  After this high profile mission failure they could find
their case substantially harder to present in the USSR.
    [Personal note - why is it that things only go really wrong with the
Russian program when I am off on a trip, and hence without my shortwave.
At one earlier conference the Soyuz TM-6 re-entry problem occurred.  Sorry
for the delay in posting this but I just got back.]
    So the Russians failed in this attempt on Mars.  It was a loss to us
all (no US probe for Phobos is scheduled yet, and probably would not occur
before 2000 AD).  It will be interesting to see if they launch a second try
in the 1990 or 1992 windows, if they can analyze the failure cause.

                                                  Glenn Chapman
                                                  MIT Lincoln Lab

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

Date: 30 Mar 89 04:05:01 GMT
From: crdgw1!steinmetz!sunspot![e-mail]  (Emmett Black)
Subject: Soviet Satellite Photos for Sale

[reported in April 1989 IEEE Spectrum; summary follows:]

The USSR is selling satellite photographs of areas all over the world
(with the notable exception of their own back yard) through a subsidiary
of the Continential Grain Company, based in New York City.
The photos boast a resolution as fine as 5 meters (16.4 feet for those
people still hung up on archaic measurements; (they can handle decimals,
can't they?))  -- prices range from $300 to $1200 each.

The New York Times reported that "U.S. experts believe that the photos
were taken by spy satellites" ...
Most of the available photos are of areas of reasonably heavy military
activity;  places like North Dakota (missile silos), Seattle, WA (subs),
and even some nice shots of the Peoples Republic of China.

Rumor has it that the US Government is now considering releasing some
of its OWN nice photographs;  ... operators are standing by ...

The Soviet photos are available from Sojuskarta;
contact ContiTrade Services Corp, 277 Park Ave., New York, NY 10172,
or call them at 212/207-5588 (what? no 800 number?!) ...

--Emmett
    J.E.Black; GE Research/K1-3C26; Schenectady, NY 12345
    [e-mail];   ...!uunet!steinmetz!crd!blackje

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

Date: 29 Mar 89 22:43:45 GMT
From: salt.uucp![e-mail]  (Dan Williams)
Subject: Re: Success with cold fusion reported

from (Miroslav Kocic)
> The discussion in this newsgroup has so far been about the authenticity
> of the Utah breakthrough, but I have two different concerns.  First, what
> if fusion turns out to create problems we don't foresee?  We didn't
> foresee radioactive waste or meltdowns back when fission was at this
> stage, and, if history teaches anything, it teaches that every benefit
> has a proportional price.  Second, what if cold fusion becomes the
> crack-cocaine of energy production?  I can imagine a thousand fanatics in
> 750 terrorist cells making an H-bomb in their kitchen.

    We don't even know if a chemical H-bomb is a feasable idea with
this technology.  I think it may be a little premature to start talking
about the sky falling.  Any way the word is out and at this point there is
probably no way you can shut this discovery down.  Once people kown that a
thing is doable then they will find a way to do it.  If the price for the
technology is too high then it won't be used.  There will be a price.
Nothing comes for free.
    In an interview I heard, one of the researchers was talking about a
period of twenty years while they look into the possiblities of this
discovery, like scaling up the size, investigating changes, enviromental
impact, and anything else their fertile little brains can come up with.  I
think twenty years is a little pesimistic on their part since there will be
a lot of presure to speed up development.  But on the plus side you can bet
that there will be not a little money thrown their way.  I think this will
tell you that they are approaching this discovery with all appropriate
caution.  There will be enough people looking at this to enumerate any
problems we can think of. If we can't think of a problem that may manefest
itself in the future then there is no way we could have known and we will
deal with it when it comes.

    Now if only this is for real then these postings have some meaning.
 _______________________________________________________
|   fusion is a reality                                 |
|   Dan Williams          uunet!salt!dan        |
|   MCDONNELL DOUGLAS      Denver CO            |
|   Any opinions expressed by me are not the         |
|   opinions of McDonnell Douglas.            |up.

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

Date: 30 Mar 89 04:23:34 GMT
From: mailrus!jarvis.csri.toronto.edu!utgpu!utzoo![e-mail]  (Henry Spencer)
Subject: Re: Room Temperature fusion, expert skepticism

In article <[e-mail]> [e-mail] (James Symon) writes:
>I'm inclined not to. My father is a theoretical physicist who worked
>for years in plasma research. I called and asked him "Say Dad, do you
>suppose if I squeezed some deuterium into a metal lattice it might
>fuse?" He just said, "No."

Whatever is going on inside that palladium -- assuming that there is
anything going on in there -- it is *not* a plasma phenomenon, so asking
a plasma physicist won't necessarily give a meaningful answer.  Better
would be to ask a chemist specializing in the subject just how close
hydrogen atoms get inside palladium, and then ask a physicist just how
close they have to get for interesting things to happen.

Unfortunately, this may -- repeat, may -- be like asking a 19th-century
physicist what he thinks of the possibility of a single bomb capable of
destroying an entire city.  There may, pure and simple, be some new and
hitherto-unsuspected effect involved, in which case *any* expert opinion
is valueless.

If you had asked a superconductivity expert, several years ago, whether
complex copper oxides would superconduct at liquid-nitrogen temperatures,
the odds are pretty good that he would have said "no".  There is still
no theoretical understanding of how liquid-nitrogen superconductors work;
the old BCS theory, which quite successfully explained superconducting
metals, cannot possibly be stretched to cover the new superconductors,
and there is no replacement theory in sight yet.  Remember that example
when assessing theoretical opinions about this issue.
--
Welcome to Mars!  Your         |     Henry Spencer at U of Toronto Zoology
passport and visa, comrade?    | uunet!attcan!utzoo!henry [e-mail]

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

Date: Thu, 30 Mar 1989 12:18-EST
From: [e-mail]
Subject: Re: SPACE Digest V9 #321

>... My question is why were there no cabin views during
>the launch? Come to think of it, I don't recall cabin views at launch

I have seen two different films with out of the window pictures during
launch.

Both were quite impressive.

The earlier one was in a film from Rockwell, and you could watch the
horizon as the sky turned darker and darker blue.... and then suddenly
the sky was BELOW you, a thin film visible on the horizon.


The other showed more clearly than any numbers how fast the shuttle
picks up speed. The shots were from the last Spacelab flight (Chang
Diaz, monkey shit, etc) and was in a northerly trajectory that seemed
to parallel the East coast of the US. You could watch the coast of
Florida slowly appear and then Georgia slide into view, and then in
rapidly increasing succession you passed everything up to Boston.
Marvelous piece of film.

Incidentally, a scientist crew member who was on the flight was giving
a talk and told of the problems of prefitted trojan-like male urine
collection devices. The fit tends to not be very good under several g's
and stress. Remember that there are crewmembers in seats above other
crew members during the boost phase.  Space flight isn't ALL glory you
know.

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

Date: 30 Mar 89 00:19:53 GMT
From: ames.arc.nasa.gov![e-mail]  (Mike Smithwick)
Subject: Re: NASA Select

[]

In article <[e-mail]> [e-mail] (Henry Spencer) writes:
>In article <Added.4Y=[e-mail]> [e-mail] (Lou Surface) writes:
>>... My question is why were there no cabin views during
>>the launch? Come to think of it, I don't recall cabin views at launch
>>on any mission - from Apollo to STS. Is this due to G-force limits
>>on operating cameras? - that would be suprising. Or is there some
>>classified ritual that occurs at T minus 0?

Several reasons I can think of:
  1) The ground controllers probably don't want to clutter up the
  shuttle's comm channels with an unecessary  wide-band transmission,
  otherwise known as TeeVee. Since the launch is perhaps the most
  communications intesive portion of the flight, I sure that all
  conceivable channels are reserved for more valuable information.

  2) The shuttle's cameras are pretty big dudes, long boxes around
  6"x6"x18" or so. They have got to be pretty heavy (>15 pounds) once
  you add in the electronics, massive zoom lenses and motors to drive
  them, etc. The mounts for the cameras are petty flimsy, and would never
  work in 1G. Launch video would require the manufacture of special
  mounting brackets.

  3) No classified ritual, as I've seen many a film taken of the crew
  during launch. (Unless they scratch themselves in certain interesting
  places that might not be too appealing :-).

  There were two U.S missions which did have video during launch :

  Gordon Cooper's Mercury flight, Faith 7. They were trying out an
  experimental slow-scan tv system which transmitted back pictures
  at about 2 seconds/frame.

  The other was the Apollo-Soyuz launch. There was a camera tucked under the
  right control panel looking up at the crew during the launch sequence.
  It's quite an interesting sequence.

On STS-30, they'll be trying out a Sony cam-corder. This might pave the
way for small, lightweight cameras which might conceivably be left on
during the launch sequence.


>There's no special problem with it that I'm aware of.  I'd assume that
>the reason is (a) the view would be boring,

Any more "boring" than 38 minutes of a crewmember throwing switches in
the Aft flight deck? :-)

>and (b) the astronauts'
>conversations are considered private unless explicitly transmitted.

The cameras do not come equipped with microphones, so any internal
conversations would not be transmitted.

>--
>Welcome to Mars!  Your         |     Henry Spencer at U of Toronto Zoology
>passport and visa, comrade?    | uunet!attcan!utzoo!henry [e-mail]
^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^  <-great signature Henry

          *** mike (cerbral GURU, insert M&Ms to restart) smithwick***
"Oh, I'm just a NOP in the instruction set of life, oh, ohhhh, hmmmmm"

[disclaimer : nope, I don't work for NASA, I take full blame for my ideas]

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

Date: 28 Mar 89 03:20:36 GMT
From: hpda!hpcuhb!hp-ses!hpcea!hpldsla![e-mail]
Subject: Re: Primordial Hydrocarbons

Mike Van Pelt writes;
> The outfit in Sweden found methane... the gas
> had been verified as being of non-biological origin, but they
> didn't explain how they had verified this.

Carbon contains two stable isotopes, carbon-12 and carbon-13.
During photosynthesis, the carbon retained in plant tissue is enriched
in carbon-12 (relative to non-biogenic carbon, such as diamond). Thus methane
of biogenic origin is usually enriched in carbon-12.

Tom O'Reilly
oreilly@hpldsla

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

Date: 30 Mar 89 05:52:49 GMT
From: nunki.usc.edu![e-mail]  (Abhay Sawant)
Subject: Two questions.


1.  I thought the idea of having spacecraft merely 'nudge' asteroids
towards earth was really neat.  Question: won't it be awfully hard to
get the exact trajectory of the asteroid correct?  Even if we're going
to be satisfied with getting it within (say) 15k km. from the center
of the earth (assume we can easily recover anything in this range),
isn't it going to be awfully hard to give the asteroid the correct
velocity vector?  Especially when you consider the awkward shape,
distribution of mass of the critter (i'm thinking engineering here).

2.  If it's not very hard getting some kind of hot fusion going, isn't
it a easy solution to the radioactive waste problem to chuck it into a
merrily burning fusion reaction?  Alternatively, shoot it into the
center of the sun.  Alternatively, shoot it at the stars.  Why have we
only thought of earth-based solutions to radioactive wastes so far?

    -ajay

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

Date: 30 Mar 89 09:30:26 GMT
From: shelby!csli![e-mail]  (Chris Phoenix)
Subject: Re: Success with cold fusion reported

In article <[e-mail]> [e-mail] (John Abt) writes:
>>[quotation deleted]
>With unlimited cheap and pollution-free energy available, we won't be
>talking about the greenhouse effect, it will be the furnace effect.

Not necessarily.
Imagine how cheap it would be, with unlimited power, to turn large areas of
land into mirrors.  Just find any sandy area such as a desert, then melt it
smooth, then sputter on some shiny metal.
I don't know the statistics on the amount of energy in sunlight falling on
the earth, but it's some amazing number of times greater than the amount
of energy we use.  In other words, we could compensate for all the energy
we use by covering a relatively small part of the earth's surface with
mirrors to reflect all the heat back out into space.  The greenhouse effect
probably traps much more heat than would be produced by any fusion we could
use.  Worrying about a "furnace effect" from fusion is almost as groundless
as worrying about one from solar energy.  (That came up in sci.nanotech a
while ago, and I gave the same answer except, "Imagine how cheap it would
be, with nanotechnology, to...")

Chris Phoenix
[e-mail]

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

End of SPACE Digest V9 #329
*******************