Space & Astronomy

home *** CD-ROM | disk | FTP | other *** search

/ Space & Astronomy / Space and Astronomy (October 1993).iso / mac / TEXT_ZIP / spacedig / V10_1 / V10_133.ZIP / V10_133

Wrap

Internet Message Format | 1991-07-08 | 17KB

Return-path: <ota+space.mail-errors@andrew.cmu.edu> X-Andrew-Authenticated-as: 7997;andrew.cmu.edu;Ted Anderson Received: from beak.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 </afs/andrew.cmu.edu/usr1/ota/Mailbox/UZAh1eS00VcJARBk5h>; Wed, 11 Oct 89 01:32:27 -0400 (EDT) Message-ID: <cZAh1-m00VcJERA05x@andrew.cmu.edu> Reply-To: space+@Andrew.CMU.EDU From: space-request+@Andrew.CMU.EDU To: space+@Andrew.CMU.EDU Date: Wed, 11 Oct 89 01:31:56 -0400 (EDT) Subject: SPACE Digest V10 #133 SPACE Digest Volume 10 : Issue 133 Today's Topics: Time Urgent: Galileo plutonium debate on CNN Moorehead named Space Station Freedeom Program Deputy Director (Forwarded) NASA Headline News for 10/06/89 (Forwarded) Ball Corp. selected for Earth Observing System contract (Forwarded) NASA to further develop 2 Explorer scientific spacecraft (Forwarded) STS-34 Launch Advisory (Forwarded) NASA spacecraft to look out into space, back in time (Forwarded) ---------------------------------------------------------------------- Date: Tue, 10 Oct 89 18:15 CDT From: Bill Higgins-- Beam Jockey <HIGGINS%FNAL.BITNET@UICVM.uic.edu> Subject: Time Urgent: Galileo plutonium debate on CNN Original_To: SPACE The safety of the Galileo Jupiter probe launch will be debated on the Cable News Network program "Sonya Live" on Wednesday, 11 October, during the 12:30-1:00 PM EDT segment. The controversial probe is powered by 48 pounds of plutonium-238 in a heavily protected radioisotope thermoelectric generator. Three groups have filed a lawsuit in an attempt to restrain NASA from going through with the launch of Galileo aboard the Space Shuttle, and some members have threatened to stage a sit-in at Kennedy Space Center in the event that legal action does not succeed. Tim Kyger, a staffer for Rep. Dana Rohrabacher (R-CA), will be speaking in favor of a Galileo launch. Opposing him will be Larry Sankin of the Christic Institute, one of the groups involved in the lawsuit. CNN's "Sonya Live" program is a call-in show, so you have a chance to express your opinion. (Sorry, I don't have their phone number!) ______meson Bill Higgins _-~ ____________-~______neutrino Fermi National Accelerator Laboratory - - ~-_ / \ ~----- proton Bitnet: HIGGINS@FNALB.BITNET | | \ / SPAN/Hepnet/Physnet: 43011::HIGGINS - - ~ Internet: HIGGINS@FNALB.FNAL.GOV ------------------------------ Date: 9 Oct 89 05:26:38 GMT From: trident.arc.nasa.gov!yee@ames.arc.nasa.gov (Peter E. Yee) Subject: Moorehead named Space Station Freedeom Program Deputy Director (Forwarded) Mark Hess Headquarters, Washington, D.C. RELEASE: 89-155 MOOREHEAD NAMED SPACE STATION FREEDEOM PROGRAM DEPUTY Richard H. Kohrs, Director, Space Station Freedom, announced today that Robert W. Moorehead will serve as the Deputy Director, Program and Operations, Space Station Freedom Program Office. James M. Sisson, who has been acting Deputy Director since June, will assume the position of Deputy Manager, Space Station Freedom Program and Operations. Moorehead is special assistant on the staff of the Director of the Johnson Space Center, Houston, and before that was Manager, NSTS Engineering Integration Office at the Johnson Space Center (JSC), Houston. As Deputy Director, Program and Operations, Moorehead will direct the space station program office, located in Reston, Va., which is responsible for the overall technical direction and content of the international space complex, including systems engineering and analysis and configuration management, budgeting and schedules. Moorehead was born in Hickory Flat, Miss. He received a bachelor of science degree in electrical engineering from Mississippi State University and a master of science degree in electrical engineering from the University of Southern California and has done graduate work at the University of Houston. Moorehead has served in various capacities since joining NASA in 1964, including Deputy Manager, Space Transportation System Orbiter and Government Furnished Equipment Projects Office and Manager, Avionics Systems Office at JSC. He is a member of numerous civic and professional engineering societies and has received a number of NASA awards, including the NASA Special Achievement Award, the NASA Exceptional Service Medal and the NASA Outstanding Leadership Medal in 1988. ------------------------------ Date: 9 Oct 89 05:44:39 GMT From: trident.arc.nasa.gov!yee@ames.arc.nasa.gov (Peter E. Yee) Subject: NASA Headline News for 10/06/89 (Forwarded) ----------------------------------------------------------------- Friday, October 6, 1989 Audio: 202/755-1788 ----------------------------------------------------------------- This is NASA Headline News for Friday, October 6..... Pre-launch preparations for the STS-34 mission continue at Kennedy Space Center. Saturday and Sunday, the Radioisotope Thermoelectric Generators...RTGs...will be be attached to the Galileo spacecraft which is already in the payload bay of the orbiter Atlantis. Today, NASA and the Justice Department filed its response in Federal District Court in Washington, D.C. in answer to the request for an injunction to stop the flight. Three anti-nuclear activist groups...the Christic Institute, the Foundation on Economic Trends and the Florida Coalition for Peace and Justice...want the court to stop the launch of the RTG-powered Galileo. The launch countdown begins at 8:00 A.M., Eastern time, Monday. A privately financed suborbital rocket carrying an Air Force and an MIT payload failed to get off the launch pad at Vandenburg Air Force Base yesterday. Moments after engine ignition, the American Rocket Company vehicle was engulfed in flames. A spokesman blamed the failure on a faulty oxygen valve. Both payloads were destroyed. NASA scientist Dr. Robert Watson has told the Washngton Post the ozone hole over Antarctica this year will be as big and bad as it was in 1987. The hole in the ozone layer over the South Pole is caused by a chemical process brought about by man-made pollutants. Data from the Goddard Space Flight Center indicates the hole will cover about 10 million square miles this year. NASA's Office of Space Science and Applications says the agency will develop two new explorer satellites. They will investigate interplanetary space and study extragalactic light sources...such as quasars. (NASA Headline News will not be filed Monday, October 9, because of the Columbus Day holiday.) * * * ----------------------------------------------------------------- Here's the broadcast schedule for public affairs events on NASA Select television. All times are Eastern. Monday, October 9.... 9:00 A.M. STS-34 countdown status report. Tuesday, October 10.... 9:00 A.M. Countdown status report 9:30 A.M. Galileo/IUS 1:00 P.M. Solar Backscatter U-V instrument 1:45 P.M. Growth hormone in plants 2:15 P.M. Polymer morphology 3:00 P.M. Student experiment 3:30 P.M. Mesoscale lightning experiment Wednesday, October 11.... 9:00 A.M. Countdown status report 11:00 A.M. The Jovian system 1:00 P.M. Pre-launch news conference All events and times are subject to change without notice. ----------------------------------------------------------------- These reports are filed daily, Monday through Friday, at 12 noon, Eastern time. ----------------------------------------------------------------- A service of the Internal Communications Branch (LPC), NASA Headquarters, Washington, D.C. ------------------------------ Date: 9 Oct 89 05:29:18 GMT From: trident.arc.nasa.gov!yee@ames.arc.nasa.gov (Peter E. Yee) Subject: Ball Corp. selected for Earth Observing System contract (Forwarded) Charles Redmond Headquarters, Washington, D.C. 4 p.m. EDT Jean Drummond Clough Langley Research Center, Hampton, Va. Release: C89-W BALL CORP. SELECTED FOR EARTH OBSERVING SYSTEM CONTRACT NASA Langley Research Center, Hampton, Va., has selected Ball Corp., Boulder, Colo., for negotiation of a contract to develop a set of instruments that will be flown on NASA polar orbiting platforms as part of the Earth observing system (Eos). The goal of Eos is to advance scientific understanding of the Earth by providing simultaneous, global, interdisciplinary data about land masses, oceans and atmosphere. Value of the two-phase contract is estimated to be $31.1 million. Phase one, a cost-plus-fixed-fee contract, is for 16 months with an estimated value of $240,000. Phase two, a cost- plus-award-fee option, will be for 106 months with an estimated value of $30.8 million. The contract will be effective Nov. 1, 1989, and the work will be performed by the Ball Electro-Optics/ Cryogenics Division, Boulder. The instrument system, known as TRACER (Tropospheric Radiometer for Atmospheric Chemistry and Environmental Research), will measure the global distribution of carbon monoxide at multiple levels in the troposphere, the lowest portion of the Earth's atmosphere. These data will be used to increase the understanding of global tropospheric chemistry, reduce the large uncertainties in the strengths of the sources of carbon monoxide, define global scale atmospheric motion, and clarify the interactions between the chemistry and the horizontal and vertical atmospheric motion. Ball Corp. will design and fabricate the instrument system, including a mass model, brassboard/aircraft model, engineering/ servicing model, protoflight model and spares; develop and validate all flight and ground support software; and provide spacecraft integration, launch, post-launch and servicing mission support. ------------------------------ Date: 9 Oct 89 05:35:47 GMT From: trident.arc.nasa.gov!yee@ames.arc.nasa.gov (Peter E. Yee) Subject: NASA to further develop 2 Explorer scientific spacecraft (Forwarded) Paula Cleggett-Haleim Headquarters, Washington, D.C. October 5, 1989 RELEASE: 89-159 NASA TO FURTHER DEVELOP 2 EXPLORER SCIENTIFIC SPACECRAFT NASA has authorized further development for two unmanned scientific spacecraft that would explore interplanetary space and study extragalactic light sources, such as quasars. These studies were submitted to NASA under the Explorer Concept program, designed to develop intermediate-size scientific experiments. The two programs are: the Lyman Far Ultraviolet Spectroscopic Explorer (FUSE) and the Advanced Composition Explorer (ACE). FUSE will use high resolution spectroscopy at wavelengths below 1200 angstrom to measure faint sources both throughout the Milky Way galaxy and at very large extragalactic distances. The science team leader for FUSE is Dr. H. Warren Moos, Johns Hopkins University, Baltimore, Md. ACE will explore the energetic particle populations observed in near-Earth interplanetary space. Measurements of these particles will allow a direct study of interstellar matter. The science team leader for ACE is Dr. E. C. Stone, California Institute of Technology, Pasadena. The cost for this phase of development, which includes definition studies and preliminary designs, is approximately $3 million for each spacecraft. The Astrophysics Division of NASA's Office of Space Science and Applications, Washington, D.C., will provide overall program management. Goddard Space Flight Center, Greenbelt, Md., will be the project management center. ------------------------------ Date: 9 Oct 89 05:33:07 GMT From: trident.arc.nasa.gov!yee@ames.arc.nasa.gov (Peter E. Yee) Subject: STS-34 Launch Advisory (Forwarded) Sarah Keegan Headquarters, Washington, D.C. October 4, 1989 STS-34 LAUNCH ADVISORY NASA officials today set Oct. 12, 1989, at 1:29 p.m. EDT, for the launch of STS-34, the next Space Shuttle flight, which will deploy the Galileo spacecraft for its mission to Jupiter. The Inertial Upper Stage computer, which had experienced bit errors, has been replaced and the replacement computer is now being checked out. ------------------------------ Date: 9 Oct 89 05:34:28 GMT From: trident.arc.nasa.gov!yee@ames.arc.nasa.gov (Peter E. Yee) Subject: NASA spacecraft to look out into space, back in time (Forwarded) Paula Cleggett-Haleim Headquarters, Washington, D.C. October 5, 1989 Carter Dove Goddard Space Flight Center, Greenbelt, Md. RELEASE: 89-158 NASA SPACECRAFT TO LOOK OUT INTO SPACE, BACK IN TIME NASA will launch a spacecraft on Nov. 9, 1989, to study the origin and dynamics of the universe, including the theory that the universe began about 15 billion years ago with a cataclysmic explosion -- the Big Bang. The Cosmic Background Explorer (COBE) spacecraft will be boosted into an Earth polar orbit from Vandenberg Air Force Base, Calif., aboard the final NASA-owned, NASA-launched Delta vehicle. By measuring the diffuse infrared radiation (cosmic background) that bombards Earth from every direction, COBE's instruments will help clarify such matters as the nature of the primeval explosion -- which started the expansion of the universe and made it uniform -- and the processes leading to the formation of galaxies. From its orbit 559 miles above Earth, COBE will carry out its cosmic search using three sophisticated instruments: the Differential Microwave Radiometer (DMR), Far Infrared Absolute Spectrophotometer (FIRAS) and Diffuse Infrared Background Experiment (DIRBE) DRM will determine whether the primeval explosion was equally intense in all directions. Patchy brightness in the cosmic microwave background would unmask the as-yet-unknown "seeds" that led to the formation of such large bodies as galaxies, clusters of galaxies, and clusters of clusters of galaxies. Measurements of equal brightness in all directions would mean the puzzle of how these systems could have condensed since the Big Bang will be even more vexing than it is today. To distinguish the emissions of our own Milky Way galaxy from the true cosmic background radiation, DMR will measure radiation from space at wavelengths of 3.3, 5.7 and 9.6 millimeters. FIRAS, covering wavelengths from 0.1 to 10 millimeters, will survey the sky twice during the year-long mission to determine the spectrum (brightness versus wavelength) of the cosmic background radiation from the Big Bang. The spectrum that would result from a simple Big Bang can be calculated with great accuracy. Such a spectrum would be smooth and uniform and have no significant releases of energy between the time of the Big Bang and the formation of galaxies. If FIRAS' measurements depart from the predicted spectrum, scientists will know that powerful energy sources existed in the early universe between these times. These sources may include annihilation of antimatter, matter falling into "black holes," decay of new kinds of elementary particles, explosion of supermassive objects and the turbulent motions that may have caused the formation of galaxies. FIRAS' sensitivity will be 100 times greater than that achieved so far by equivalent ground-based and balloon-borne instruments. Producing a spectrum for each of 1,000 parts of the sky, the FIRAS data will allow scientists to measure how much light was radiated by the Big Bang. DIRBE will search for the diffuse glow of the universe beyond our galaxy in the wavelength range from 1 to 300 micrometers. In the final analysis, any uniform infrared radiation that remains will be very rich in information about the early universe. One possible source would be light from primordial galaxies shifted into the far infrared by the expansion of the universe. NASA's Goddard Space Flight Center, Greenbelt, Md., designed and built the 5,000-pound spacecraft and its three infrared- and microwave-measuring instruments. Goddard also will manage the launch and analyze the data returned by COBE during its 1-year nominal mission. Looking out into space, back in time, the COBE spacecraft will undertake the esoteric task of providing new insights into the origin and evolution of the universe. ------------------------------ End of SPACE Digest V10 #133 *******************