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More coverage at Spacedaily, Space.com, and of course the usual news outlets CNN et al...

Cool! Thanks, I just spotted this

Aaaaack! [space.com]

One could extend this loophole even further, I think. (So to speak.)

For example, here is a great picture of the comet's anus.

Look, I've beaten the Slashdot domain-feature-thing! Woot!

The comet image looks a lot like the comet in the intro to Deep Space Nine. (Coincidently, there's a banner ad for DS9 on DVD...)

it's vulnerable to XSS exploitation as well...hrmmm.. (just pops an alert() saying "test")

You should have converted the text to hex...

http://space.com/php/multimedia/imagedisplay/img_d isplay.php?pic=h_wild2-comet_02.jpg&cap=%4A%65%73% 75%73%20%4C%6F%76%65%73%20%50%65%6E%69%73

Aliens have left us a message in the image caption. Be afraid.

Yeah, I know...lame joke. *sigh*

Really? $150 million in new funding was announced in October, and they had been planning a flight for mid-December which didn't eventuate, but I can't find anything about it being cancelled. It's probably just been postponed. Again.

Advertisers always look at anything as an advertising channel that they have some right to stuff with their .. ads. Billboards, buses, your clothing, foreheads, whatever. The day after someone makes the Paint the Moon trick work, count on advertising up there. (Especially since no one owns the Moon.)

For those that want to read up on the STS-107, Look Here. Maybe you'll read that and understand my flawed assumption.

... hope you don't claim to be a scientist.

"During those days there was a measurable difference in the diurnal temprature variations due to lack of contrails."

The above statement, except the part in italics is possibly true. The "measurable difference" is only if you choose your margin of error to favour what you want to believe.

And that adjustment of data is what makes climate change and human involvement such bunk. Case in point: if we understand the atmospheric chemistry so very well as to make the dire predictions of our effect on it, why are we continually surprised by it(auroras at unexpected heights)?

It seems the height of presumption to believe that we humans, greatly outnumbered as we are by numerous other species, have anything but a local impact on this huge complex planet. Signs of our passage, like cockroach droppings, may be everywhere but it does not mean that we are having any effect in the grand scheme.

Please remember that slashcode won't allow the posting of long text with no whitespace.

Here is a link to The Strange case of Fobos-2

Beagle 2's official site.

Space.com's Mars Rover section.

European Space Agency's Mars Express website.

I'm not so sure that humans are the root cause behind any global warming, especially after seeing that Mars is just coming out of an ice age of its own. Given that humans have had, like, zero impact on the climate of Mars, but solar output has impact on both Mars and Earth, doncha think that global warming might, just might, be caused by the sun, not humans?

I'm not saying that humankind has no impact on Earth's climate, but that maybe blaming us for global warming is just another Chicken Little espousing that the sky is falling. We'll likely know better, in a few million years or so. Till then, I'm not holding my breath.

Take my word for it (or don't), this is going to be huge! The early marketing (completely different from any other way of merketing you've ever seen) suggests they've put a lot of thought into this. As soon as the marketing itself becomes a story (look out for CNN, Time and others to cover "The making of the marketing campaign"), they've got even more free airtime. People will trailer that fooled them to believe it was a real add, and by the time the movie arrives everyone's going to go and see it.

It's the cleverest marketing ploy since people/companies started using eBay to generate free publicity for themselves.

To call angular resolution "image clarity" is greatly oversimplifying things. Angular resolution is a product of the size of the dish and the wavelength of the light observed. (Thus spectral coverage is not distinct from angular resolution). The atmosphere does pose a problem, but building the telescopes at higher elevations can greatly reduce distortion.

Extremely high angular resolution can be achieved on earth by linking up several telescopes. For instance, the VLBI technique created a telescope spanning 5,280 miles- with enough resolving power to, "sit in New York and be able to see the dimples on a golf ball in Los Angeles."

Space telescopes are great, but until it becomes cheaper to get large telescopes into orbit or on the moon nothing beats the basement bargain earth telescope.

See this.

The 'Space Robot' (SR), with an in-built 'RUDAC' communication signal processor, will be used to capture damaged satellites and space debris from crashing to Earth, CSRDC-CSRL and ISRDO Director Dr M Sreedhar Dayal told UNI.

Putting aside the poor translation, it's clear that the article's writer doesn't have much of a scientific background. Unless you're talking about a mass comparable to the Compton Gamma Ray Observatory or perhaps the Hubble, there's not much need to prevent debris from "crashing into the earth". 100,000 feet of atmosphere does a fine job by itself, and puts on a great light show to boot.

The obvious benefit of this space scoop is to clear NEO of the sort of debris that occasionally causes the ISS and the Shuttle to take evasive maneuvers from time to time.

But I know what I'd be interested in, if I were a developing nation with orbital capability. The space around Earth is turning into the next big salvage yard, especially if the costs of this mission are comparable to a high-profile terrestrial salvage operation. What better way to find out what other nations have been doing in the space above your country, than to grab a few samples of their equipment?

It's even better than a earthbound salvage operation, because there's no weathering beyond radiation and collisions with other pieces of debris. A defunct spy satellite would be in as good a condition now as it was the day it entered orbit, especially in terms of reverse-engineering. The chips may have a few bits shorted out, but the circuit boards, wiring harnesses, optics, propulsion systems, and so on could hold a trove of information.

And there's one thing I'm dying to do -- buy space knicknacks. NASA and the Russians could probably fund a significant space program by simply selling off that ton or so of "trash" brought back by each shuttle mission or burnt up in the used Progress craft. If India can bring back space nuts, old thruster bells, and the like, they could make a killing on eBay!

Check out the MOOSE "ejector seat" system - now there's something I'd give my right arm to have a go on.

Bush simply cut the budget, it was NASA's decision to axe the X-38 project (the lifeboat) to save money. And why did they choose that?

This Space.com article sheds some light:

"[NASA deputy administrator] Gregory testified that at the time of X-38?s cancellation, it appeared to NASA that the Crew Return Vehicle would not be ready until 2008. Cost also entered into the equation, Gregory said, with some estimates coming back as high as $3 billion to $5 billion, a figure several times larger than NASA's earlier $1.2 billion estimate."

In other words, it was unbelievably late and unbelievably over budget; that is, typically (post-Apollo) NASA. In my searches, I ran across articles from 1998 and 1999 talking about the X38 project, and how it was going to fly by 2002 or 2003. Apparently that was somewhat unrealistic, or NASA badly mismanaged the project.

NASA had a choice of things to cancel. They chose to cancel the X-38, which had already had test flights, to develop an Orbital Space Plane instead, which hasn't even been designed.

Bush may have cut the budget, but he didn't kill the project. At most, he put it out of its misery.

Especially given the amount of bits and bobs attached in the concept picture, I assume the plan is to launch it in pieces for assembly in orbit.

This may well be true, but as this video shows, it also expands like an erector set.

It could be that the "compact" version is designed to fit within either a current launch vehicle or to minimize the trips/assembly necessary.

Helium 3 is a likely substance for early lunar mining.

When scientists look for life out side the solar system, why don't they focus on moons of Jupiter like planets instead of finding Earth like planets.

Actually, they have looked for moons around extrasolar planets that eclipse their star. The main example (so far) of the "transiting technique" is HD 209458b, a hot Jupiter in a 3-day period. This transit has been observed using Hubble, with a sensitivity that would allow one to detect Saturn-like rings or moons as small as twice the size of Earth. None were found. More information here.

Of course, a 3-day period planet's moon would still be unable to harbor life as we know it (too hot). But these are the first steps being taken to look for such objects. As more transiting planets are detected, this technique will tell us a lot about moon systems around these planets.

Moons of giant planets in temperate zones may indeed be the key to finding life-sustaining bodies. Our own Moon stabilizes the rotational axis of the Earth, which prevents many extreme climatic changes. Compare this to Mars, which has no large moons (only two small ones) that lead to the same stability. A giant planet would have a similar affect on the dynamics. This is just one example of how a second body (in our case, the Moon) aids the development of life. One can ponder how much the probability of life drops off if such a body does not exist, though I'm not sure anyone has a convincing answer, yet.

We can barely image planets that are twice the size of Jupiter and you are suggesting we should image MOONS!?

So far, scientists have been unable to image any extra-solar planets at all. The planets have been detected indirectly--by looking at the effects of the planet on the star. An overview of these techniques. Astronomers have directly imaged brown dwarfs, which are somewhat like both planets and stars. We can't yet image exoplanets, but we can still learn a lot about them.

Direct imaging of planets may be made with the Keck Interferometer in Nulling Mode (a similar setup is being designed for the LBTI in Arizona, and the European VLTI), or with "Extreme Adaptive Optics", or finally with the Terrestrial Planet Finder.

Especially in light of another post talking about plastic bags--the material they're talking about in the link is a polyethylene composite.

What was just as interesting to me, though, is the radiation map linked to in the story. It shows the radiation risk across different regions of Mars.

Am I misreading the map? It appears there's a big region in the south, as well as some regions near the north poles, that doesn't have very much exposure at all. Is that right? Is it an artifact? What are those regions? Why don't they go there?

Here's the link: link

"it'd explode instantaneously, and no, you -wouldn't- hear it, it's in SPACE, there's no AIR, so there's no SOUND-"

Actually, if you would be looking at the satellite in space and see it explode, you would very much hear it. While it is true that the near absence of air means that a person would not hear any sound from a shockware that travels through the air, but from the explosion that person would very well hear the many high-velocity particles ticking, and thunking against his/her vessel. If you have experienced any explosions of significance, or have enough imagination, you will know what kind of rain of particles I'm talking about. Just a week ago, astronauts were shaken up by a sound that probably was produced by such a space particle. So you would hear the explosion in space, just differently than on earth.

Now about the no air - no sound thing: Things like "there is no sound in space" that they teach kids in high school are ususally oversimplified or just plain wrong. Did you know that black holes actually emit sounds?

"it'd explode instantaneously, and no, you -wouldn't- hear it, it's in SPACE, there's no AIR, so there's no SOUND-"

Actually, if you would be looking at the satellite in space and see it explode, you would very much hear it. While it is true that the near absence of air means that a person would not hear any sound from a shockware that travels through the air, but from the explosion that person would very well hear the many high-velocity particles ticking, and thunking against his/her vessel. If you have experienced any explosions of significance, or have enough imagination, you will know what kind of rain of particles I'm talking about. Just a week ago, astronauts were shaken up by a sound that probably was produced by such a space particle. So you would hear the explosion in space, just differently than on earth.

Now about the no air - no sound thing: Things like "there is no sound in space" that they teach kids in high school are ususally oversimplified or just plain wrong. Did you know that black holes actually emit sounds?

I would like to see a more detailed analysis of his cost estimates -- $15 billion seems rather low for "developing a new, more flexible launch vehicle," designing a sophisticated (and large) long-life station, shipping the thing up to L1 point, and assembling it.

Yup. Building a new ISS and putting it 700 times farther away, out in the searing radiation beyond the Van Allen belts, is going to cost more. ISS cost $100 billion , so I shudder to think what Buzz' rig would cost. Throw in logistics and the usual geopolitical tug-of war, and you'd better tack on one or two more zeros to the price.

BTW, I've dined with Buzz. He's a hella nice guy who asks a lot of questions, is generous with his ideas, and is patient with the tongue-tied adoration of space freaks such as myself and the two others who joined us. That's why it's so shocking to see him suggest something with such completely bogus numbers as this.

I see a few reasons why the Moon might be a better idea.

• The Lagrange station idea has the same problem as all space stations - what happens when the next X28+ solar flare happens to be pointed at the Earth? At least you can be safely underground on the Moon.
• The Moon offers the possibility of a self-sustaining colony, which is much less likely with a station.
• The idea of a lunar colony is, I believe, much more appealing to the American public than "yet another [white elephant] space station".
• The Chinese are going to the Moon, are we just going to leave it to them? What if they do find signficant, recoverable water there?
• Despite his rhetoric, our grandfathers never founded a colony on the Moon.

Aside from all that, the Moon isn't bad at all as a launching point to the planets. You only need enough booster, catapult (thanks again, Heinlein!) or combination of the two to get into a couple-kilometer orbit. Then, you can use an efficient, low thrust engine, as are finally becoming available today, to go from there. That is a far cry from launching from the Earth's surface, though perhaps not quite as optimal as a Lagrange station.

I do agree with his points regarding NASA's vehicle programs - they need to design some innovative new vehicles (or better yet, private enterprise does!). IMO what we need most is massive heavy lift capabilities...

First off you have to remember that Buzz is now in the spaceflight hardware business. While the Earth Moon L1 LaGrange point does offer intersting possibilites for being a gateway to the solar system, this really just sounds like another International Space Station. I worry about under utilization, a wandering mission objective, and massive operational costs. Not that a lunar surface base will be cheap. The big difference in my mind is the availability of raw materials on the surface. You won't have to launch as much mass from Earth. This would especially true if there really is water in the polar craters. Nevertheless, having a bunch of lunar soil to pile up for shielding would be a tremendous advantage. You also do not have to maintain the orbit of the moon (unlike an EM-L1 gateway). The other big advantage of the lunar base over EM-L1 is that once there you actually have things to do and places to explore. Just imagine having some large otpical, IR, and radio telescopes on the darkside of the moon - away from all of the earth-bound noise/light pollution. The possibilities are vast. Maybe we should go to the moon first and then build one of those carbon nanotube elevators from the surface to EM-L1 later.

Here are Terrestrial Planet Finder links at:

• NASA JPL (Flash animation)
• Caltech
• Space.com

For example, (your points 1 and 2) the error margin on the age of the universe is down to 1%, at 13.7 +/- 0.2 billion years. That there are objects that appeared to be older than that is due to another recently discovered phenomena, that the expansion of the universe is actually accelerating. That nowscape.com page you point to is obsolete.

(3) I have heard of the galactic rotation problem, I don't know what (if anything) the concordance model says about it.

(4) The large scale structure depends a lot on the nature of fluctuations in the early universe. Not enough is known about them to say anything, but there is no reason why a structure should take a long time to form just because it is large.

See here for a more recent article on the age of the universe.

Read up!

The theory is there's a companion dwarf star to our Sun 1-3 light years away. Here's some info.

Nowhere in this piece of press release is there mention of the end result of eating in space: pooping in space. I could only find links to press release material about the toilet, though, too.

That's true.

No, it's not . Hmm... on second thought, it may be true that he didn't think it, but you can't know that :-)

That's true.

No, it's not . Hmm... on second thought, it may be true that he didn't think it, but you can't know that :-)

A google search for hull repair kits gave me nothing useful, does anyone else know if such a thing has been developed for the ISS?

The Russians consider themselves less rigid and more inventive than the Americans, who tend to follow every letter in the technical manuals, said Sergei Gorbunov, a spokesman for the Russian Space Agency.

Actually, that was a quote from another space.com article. Here is the link.

I'm really not sure that this is very significant news. This does not appear to be a far reaching discovery, rather I think it "made the papers" because meteorites are cool and exciting, and a new mineral sounds novel.

On the topic of minerals:

Mineral names are always interesting. They often have absolutely no relation to the substance they identify, let alone follow a systematic naming convention. Many minerals have several names, some more accepted than others, some designated long before geology was a science, and most with little reason and only slightly more rhyme. So, since the names don't have to make sense, discoverers have a lot of leeway when naming minerals.

Apparently this got started in the early days of geology before people figured out any chemistry. When someone found a chunk of something, it would get whatever random name seemed good at the time. Unfortunately, after chemistry was discovered, no effort was made to go backward and rename all the old minerals. So mineral names are something of chaos. We have minerals from actinolite, to kaolinite, to rutile, to zircon, and thousands of others that are almost completely meaningless to any well educated person who doesn't already know what they are.

Chemistry, in its early formitive days as a real science, noticed the mess geologists had made of that nomenclature, and wisely decided to systematize chemical names. Of course mineral compositions are covered under the wider blanket of inorganic chemistry, but geologists still don't refer to minerals by systematic chemical names.

Here's a real example of how silly things can get:
One day around 1977 a geologist discovered a new mineral, and thus got to name it. He wanted to honor another geologist who had the last name of Thompson, but discovered to his dismay that there was already a mineral named thompsonite. But not to be deterred from his original intent, and knowing Mr. Thompson's first name was Jim, he dubbed the new mineral jimthompsonite. Which was all well-and-good, but later a monoclinic variation of the mineral was discovered, so it was named (following scant conventions) clinojimthompsonite.

But that doesn't really tell you too much about the mineral. For the record, clinojimthompsonite is a soft amphibole group mineral.

Guidelines for naming a new mineral generally revolve around how easy it is to pronounce, whether it honors someone in the field, and how much like some other mineral name it sounds. Compare this to the process for naming martian craters!

It's really not too weird to discover new minerals, although it's also not exceptionally commonplace; there are a lot of different ways to combine the naturally occurring elements in inorganic crystals at the Earth's range of temperatures and pressures.

Definition of a mineral, with examples:

For the record, a mineral is commonly accepted to be a mineral given all the following:
(Note: these criteria aren't exactly set in stone, but I can't think of anything that's regarded as a mineral that doesn't fit them.)

inorganic
solid
ordered crystal structure
definite chemical composition
naturally occurring


From a practical point of view, if it's a naturally occurring crystal with a unique X-ray diffraction pattern, it shouldn't be too surprising if it's accepted as a new mineral.

A few examples of what aren't minerals:
Obsidian (volcanic glass) can't be a mineral because it doesn't have an ordered crystal structure.
Coal isn't a mineral because, among others, it is organic.
Various formulas of steel aren't minerals because although they're crystalline (microscopically), they are man made.

Please learn how to make a link, rather than subject /. to another spaced-out URL!

Here's the Space.com article.

- Peter

Simple, paint the moon red :-)

http://www.space.com/scienceastronomy/generalscien ce/laser_moon_010810-1.html

you only need about 24880 more

Is it just me or the first astronaut in this picture is likelly telling the other about the size of that fish he caught and let go? ;)

Wasn't there alot of talk of a certain isotope of helium that can be used for nucleur fusion ?
Here it is Helium-3 but they say it's economically unfeasible.

past issues

Not the same, but you can't ignore the price.

Er, I certainly didn't state "there IS ice under there". I just said that this finding is perfectly consistent with millions or billions of tons of ice being in the region regardless. (BTW the figure I saw in a more recent article was that there might be as much as 6 billion tons of water at the lunar poles.)

You, on the the other hand, stated that this meant that there weren't even "1,000s of tons" of water, which is completely incorrect. See the difference?

This is a good article about the initial discovery.

Here is a analysis of the various reasons that an earlier attempt (impact and look for water vapor spectral lines) might not have detected measurable water.

This article includes more analysis, and includes this pithy quote:

"The results of the most detailed radar study to date of the moon's shadowy poles don't mean the moon is bone-dry."

Also:

"Prospector found elevated levels of hydrogen -- a component of water -- around the moon's poles, with the highest readings in the perpetually shaded craters. But the evidence for ice was indirect."

Hope that helped!