March 16, 2022 Zimmerman/Batchelor podcast
Embedded below the fold in two parts.
To listen to all of John Batchelor’s podcasts, well worth your time, go here.
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Author: Robert Zimmerman
Rob Paravonian – Pachelbel Rant
An evening pause: Pachelbel’s Canon in D is one of the most beautiful short pieces of music ever written, which of course is why it has been an evening pause a half dozen times before. I’ve posted a version of musicians jamming it at 3 am when they have nothing better to do, singing it a capella in a stairway, spectacularly on a guitar, as heavy metal, by a chicken (you have to watch it to understand), and played as a tango, bluegrass, gypsy, and practically any musical style you can imagine.
The rant below gives us the perspective of someone who has played the piece, and it is a perspective that might surprise you. After watching it enjoy all the other versions above, but above all make sure you watch the last one. You will then understand best what the cello player is thinking.
Alignment of segments in Webb’s primary mirror completed
Click for full image.
Astronomers and engineers have now successfully completed the alignment of the eighteen segments in the primary mirror of the James Webb Space Telescope.
On March 11, the Webb team completed the stage of alignment known as “fine phasing.” At this key stage in the commissioning of Webb’s Optical Telescope Element, every optical parameter that has been checked and tested is performing at, or above, expectations. The team also found no critical issues and no measurable contamination or blockages to Webb’s optical path. The observatory is able to successfully gather light from distant objects and deliver it to its instruments without issue.
The picture to the right shows that alignment, focused on a single star. As noted in the caption:
While the purpose of this image was to focus on the bright star at the center for alignment evaluation, Webb’s optics and NIRCam are so sensitive that the galaxies and stars seen in the background show up.
After many years delay and an ungodly budget overrun, thank goodness Webb appears to be working better than expected.
It will still be several months before actual science observations begin. Further more precise alignment adjustments need to be done for all its instruments and mirrors.
Solar scientist Eugene Parker passes away at 94
R.I.P. Solar scientist Eugene Parker, whose research revolutionized solar science in the 20th century and for which the Parker Solar Probe was named, has passed away at the age 94.
As a young professor at the University of Chicago in the mid-1950s, Parker developed a mathematical theory that predicted the solar wind, the constant outflow of solar material from the Sun. Throughout his career, Parker revolutionized the field time and again, advancing ideas that addressed the fundamental questions about the workings of our Sun and stars throughout the universe.
Parker belonged to the past generations of scientists who followed the principles of the Enlightenment and believed that science was fundamentally the search for truth. He understood he could always be wrong, which brought a certain muscular strength to any ideas he proposed. He could not be lazy in any way, or his work would fail. Instead, it shone, and made what little we know of the Sun today possible.
Sadly, such men are one-by-one going from us. I wonder if the new generations will understand his mindset.
Pushback: Professor sues University of Illinois officials for suspending him for doing his job
University of Illinois: run by clowns
Jason Kilborn, a tenured law professor at the University of Illinois who had been suspended and forced to undergo sensitivity training because several unnamed students objected to an exam question that referenced racial slurs and that Kilborn had been using in his tests for a decade, has now sued a number of officials at the university.
University of Illinois Chicago law Professor Jason Kilborn’s recently filed lawsuit accuses administrators of violating his Constitutional rights, as well as defamation, false light and intentional infliction of emotional distress. It seeks damages in excess of $100,000.
Kilborn has been described by students as “top notch.” As his lawsuit against the University of Illinois Chicago moves forward, Kilborn maintains campus leaders engaged in performative retribution against him.
The lawsuit can be read here.
The named officials in the lawsuit are Michael Amiridis, the university’s chancellor, Caryn A. Bills, its associate chancellor, Julie M. Spanbauer, the law schools dean, Donald Kamm, the director of the school’s Office for Access and Equity, and Ashley Davidson, the school’s Title Ix & Equity Compliance Specialist.
I had described Kilborn’s blacklisting back in November 2021, describing in detail how Kilborn’s exam question had been in use for ten years with no objection, and was designed to help his law students uncover facts that would help lawyers defend minorities against racial abuse. I also noted that:
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Recent avalanche on Mars
Click for full image.
For full images go here and here.
Cool image time! Today the science team for the high resolution camera on Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter (MRO) released images showing a very recent avalanche, or slumping, on the interior slopes of what looks like a small three-mile-wide crater inside the easternmost reaches of the giant canyon Valles Marineris.
The comparison above, reduced and rotated to post here, is their close-up showing the change, which occurred sometime between March 2021 and February 2022. The wider comparison on the right, cropped, reduced, and annotated by me, shows a wider view to help place this slumping in the context of the crater.
Calling this an avalanche is not really accurate, as it isn’t really the fall of boulders and rocks, but the quick slumping downward of an entire section of what looks like dust or sand. As Alfred McEwen of the Lunar & Planetary Laboratory in Arizona writes in the caption:
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Overview of the impact Russia’s invasion is having on the Ukraine’s space industry
Link here. The summary focuses on the major aerospace regions in the Ukraine, Dnipro and Kharkiv, outlining how they have so far been untargeted by the Russian invasion.
“In Dnipro, Yuzhmash and Yuzhnoye have not been bombed or targeted by missile attacks so far. One of the possible reasons is that Russia’s plan is to take them over as part of their invasion, so they intend to keep these facilities intact,” Usov said. “Because of the Russian attacks in the Dnipro region, these facilities are not operating at full capacities, and they were forced to halt work on their projects. But a share of their employees ensures their operations continue.”
The situation is the same in Kharkiv. No aerospace facilities have been directly targeted, but the war has shut down some operations, while others — especially those partnering with western nations or companies — have gone almost entirely virtual.
The article also describes a Ukrainian startup, Orbit Boy, that is trying to develop an air-launched smallsat rocket in partnership with companies in Poland and Italy. The war is making this development difficult, if not impossible.
China tests rocket engine for the next Long March 5B launches
China’s state-run press today revealed that a full duration test has been successfully completed of the rocket engine that will be used by the core first stage of the Long March 5B rocket that will launch the next two modules for China’s Tiangong space station.
Developed by the China Aerospace Science and Technology Corporation, the engine is designed for the core stage of the Long March-5 carrier rocket series, which will be used to launch two lab modules of China’s orbiting Tiangong space station this year.
The long-range test, lasting 520 seconds, has verified the reliability of the engine, and there will be more than 20 experimental tasks that the rocket engine will undergo to further test its performance, the company disclosed.
Though this short press release does not say, it implies that this new engine is restartable, something that on previous launches of the Long March 5B was not possible for the core stage. This lack meant that once the core stage lifted and deployed its payload into orbit, it no longer had an engine that could control it. It would within weeks crash to Earth, threatening many habitable areas around the globe. This lack also resulted in a lot of very bad press for China.
If this new engine is restartable, it means that China will be able to de-orbit it in a controlled manner, over the ocean. If so, hallelujah! It means China will finally be honoring its obligations under the Outer Space Treaty.
If not, than China will continue to prove that it is an unreliable and dangerous player on the world stage.
NASA extends Ingenuity’s mission through September ’22
Click for interactive map.
NASA yesterday officially extended Ingenuity’s flight operations on Mars at least through September 2022, outlining in detail the helicopter’s hoped-for flight targets.
The map to the right shows the helicopter’s present location with the green dot, with its two possible future routes proceeding from this location indicated by dashed lines. The red dot indicates Perseverance’s present location, with its planned route from this spot indicated by the dashed lines.
Scheduled for no earlier than March 19, Ingenuity’s next flight will be a complex journey, about 1,150 feet (350 meters) in length, that includes a sharp bend in its course to avoid a large hill. After that, the team will determine whether two or three more flights will be required to complete the crossing of northwest Séítah.
Once Ingenuity crosses the rough terrain and reaches the delta, it will then be used to do more route scouting for the rover.
Upon reaching the delta, Ingenuity’s first orders will be to help determine which of two dry river channels Perseverance should take when it’s time to climb to the top of the delta. Along with routing assistance, data provided by the helicopter will help the Perseverance team assess potential science targets. Ingenuity may even be called upon to image geologic features too far afield (or outside of the rover’s traversable zone), or perhaps scout landing zones and caching sites for the Mars Sample Return program.
This ambitious plan exists because both the helicopter and its engineering team have far exceeded expectations. At the moment, there is no obvious reason why Ingenuity cannot continue to operate for years, an expectation that no one predicted.
Tatiana Eva-Marie & Avalon Jazz Band – Si Tu Vois Ma Mère
An evening pause: Hat tip Charlie Tutino.
Launching a rocket using atomic explosions?
Glenn Reynolds and Leigh Outten have just co-written a short paper advocating the use of “pulsed nuclear space propulsion” to launch rockets. You can download it here.
The concept, as first described in the 1950s, is described in the paper as follows:
It is not a tremendous surprise that when you set off an atomic bomb next to something, that something will move. That it could also remain essentially intact, however, was considerably more surprising. The challenge for the Orion team was to produce a spacecraft that could function after being subjected to not one, but many, nearby nuclear detonations, and that could be steered and navigated by an onboard crew.
This turned out to be easier than it sounds. The Orion spacecraft design that resulted involved a large steel “pusher” plate, behind a rather large spacecraft with a total weight of over 4,000 tons. That sort of design is very different from the spaceships we’re used to today.
The bulk of their paper reviews the legal obstacles to launching such rockets, as both the Outer Space Treaty and the Limited Test Ban Treaty put limits on the use of nuclear weapons in space. The paper argues that these limits would not apply to rockets propelled by atomic explosions, since the explosions would not be used as weapons.
The paper also argues that the technical obstacles for building such rockets are also solvable, and might even be easy to solve. This particular quote stood out starkly to me:
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Today’s blacklisted American: Second-grade child punished for talking about Christianity
Persecuting Christians, even little children, is once again cool!
They’re coming for you next: A second-grader at North Hill Elementary School in Des Moines, Washington, has been regularly harassed and punished by the teachers and administrators because she likes to talk about her Christian religion to her playmates.
The harassment has included searching her backpack each morning to confiscate any Christian materials before she entered school. The punishment included sending her to the principal’s office ten different times since January 1st for daring to mention the Bible and her Christian beliefs to others. From the press release of the American Center for Law and Justice (ACLJ), which is threatening to sue the school and its district if this Soviet-type censorious behavior does not stop:
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