Very brief descriptions, with appropriate links, of current or recent news items.
The space war continues. Now a group of 30 Nobel Laureates, astronauts, former NASA officials, and others have sent a letter to the House Science Committee, supporting Obama’s proposals for NASA’s budget and criticizing the House’s own budget plans.
Better late than never. An independent academic panel has concluded that the IPCC needs reform.
The solid rocket first stage of the Ares I rocket successfully completed its second test fire yesterday.
It appears that the Chinese have successfully maneuvered two unmanned satellites to a rendezvous in space. It is even possible that they might have touched!
This guy is thinking ahead: a paper extolling the scientific benefits of interstellar space travel (published in a 2009 issue of the Journal of the British Interplanetary Society) was made available today on the Los Alamos astro-ph website. Fun quote from the abstract:
Significant benefits are identified in the fields of interstellar medium studies, stellar astrophysics, planetary science and astrobiology. In the latter three areas the benefits would be considerably enhanced if the interstellar vehicle is able to decelerate from its interstellar cruise velocity to rest relative to the target system. Although this will greatly complicate the mission architecture, and extend the overall travel time, the scientific benefits are such that this option should be considered seriously in future studies.
Still doubt the magnitude of the turnover expected in the November 2010 election? Then consider Gallup’s most recent generic poll, which has the Republicans now up by 10 points, the most in history. Key quote:
The Republican leads of 6, 7, and 10 points this month are all higher than any previous midterm Republican advantage in Gallup’s history of tracking the generic ballot, which dates to 1942. Prior to this year, the highest such gap was five points, measured in June 2002 and July 1994. Elections in both of these years resulted in significant Republican gains in House seats.
More news from Chile: The trapped miners are not only getting food and toiletries, they are getting Playstation Portables for playing video games to pass the time!
A four person team of NASA scientists are heading to Chile to aid in the mine rescue efforts.
Evidence continues to build that volcanic activity on Venus has occurred in the very recent past, and might even be going on today.
India announced today the scientific instruments it plans for its second lunar probe, scheduled for launch in 2013. India is building the orbiter and Russia is building the lander/rover.
SpaceX has requested from the launch range Oct 23 as its next Falcon 9 test launch date. In this test they will give their Dragon capsule its first test flight.
Japan and Europe are both considering an upgrade to their unmanned cargo carriers so that each can also return cargo from ISS.
