Proving General Relativity with Crystal Balls

Gonzo, the Pirate King of the Underworld writes "It sounds like something out of one of those magazines that you might find at a grocery story checkout stand, but as is typical with news sensationalism, it is a play on words for what is really going on. Researchers at Stanford University, in cooperation with NASA, are preparing an experiment consisting of four extremely precise gyroscopes in the form of quartz crystal spheres. The Relativity Mission will last a year in an attept to measure the effects of frame-dragging and geodetic precession, and give scientists a means of testing General Relativity. "

Comments

Re:Why does Einstein look so bummed?

[esme]

If I'm not mistaken, it's from the famous photograph of Einstein taken by W. Eugene Smith. Smith and Einstein were discussing the ramifications of relativity and the nuclear bomb, and Einstein fell into something of a stupor as he pondered the horrible things that his science had made possible. It was then that Smith took this photo.

I think it would be hard to find a better icon of science: at once brilliant discovery and sobering consequences.

-Esme

The Project That Ate Stanford

[gilroy]

I was at Stanford for grad school back in the early nineties, and GPB occupied a special place in grad student lore. On the one hand, it's sounds really cool and obviously pushes the edge of the envelope on a host of technologies. (Something not mentioned in the article: They had to invent a way to screen magnetic fields, so someone came up with inflatable superconducting "balloons", since superconductors exclude the field within them. After twelve or so layers of balloons, the magnetic field was lower in the test chamber than the field in the great voids between superclusters...)

On the other hand, it seemed that they got a large share of resources for a project that had been in place for thirty (and now nearly forty) years. There are whole dynasties of physicists who have worked on essentially nothing else during that time. I'm not saying it is wrong, exactly, but it was odd to talk to GPB people while struggling to get a grant to keep your lab going for just one more year.

The article fails to mention the extended time that this experiment has been going on. After all, although 13 months sounds like a lot, it's really only 2.5% of the total project time -- well below most probes, I think. We used to joke that the launch date -- which I distinctly remember being announced as 1994 -- slips at a rate of slightly more than one year per year.

It'll be nice when they start getting the results they've been working towards for so long.

Those gyroscopes are cool

[Randy Rathbun]

There was a thing around the first of the year in one of the astronomy magazines talking about the gyroscopes this thing will be using. Apparently they are so precise that once they are spinning if you cut the power the things will continue to spin for the next 4000 years.

To me that is mind blowing....