Very brief descriptions, with appropriate links, of current or recent news items.
The cooling system on ISS is finally running normally again after the three spacewalks to replace the system’s failed pump.
Despite increasing use by humans, the plastic pollution floating in the North Atlantic ocean has not increased over the last two decades,and scientists don’t know why. From the Science press notice:
The authors propose a handful of possible explanations for why more discarded plastic is not appearing out in the open Atlantic Ocean. It may break up into pieces too small to be collected by the nets, or it might be sinking beneath the surface. Or, it might be consumed by marine organisms. More research will be necessary to determine the likelihood of each scenario.
The Obama administration has blocked South Korea from selling over a hundred thousand American-made surplus rifles to American gun collectors.
Mud volcanoes on Mars.
Take a look at these pictures of the August 12 drop test of SpaceX’s Dragon capsule.
Though this only confirms what the Russians learned on Mir, scientists have determined that long periods in weightlessness cause a significant loss in muscle strength. More research like this — to both study the problem as well as possibly solve it — is exactly what we need to do on ISS. Key quote:
Damage caused to the tissue is such that it is equivalent to a 30- to 50-year-old crew member’s muscles deteriorating to that of an 80-year-old. Despite in-flight exercise, the report warns that the destructive effects of extended weightlessness to skeletal muscle poses a significant safety risk for future manned missions to Mars and further afield.
European scientists, using the Very Large Telescope at the European Southern Observatory, have determined that a magnetar (a neutron star pulsar with an extremely strong magnetic field) was formed from a star with a mass 40 times that of the Sun. This is a significant discovery, as most theories say that any star this heavy should instead become a black hole when it dies. That this particular star instead became a neutron star challenges present astronomical theory.
Check out this list of the 25 most bizarre coins that are legal tender. I especially like all the Somalia coins, shaped like guitars, motorcycles, animals, and sports cars.
The Dog Whisperer’s seven rules for becoming a successful dog owner.
News you can use! Eating chocolate in reasonable quantities lowers your heart risk!
NASA ex-worker pleads guilty to stealing Sally Ride’s spacesuit.
For the next two weeks I am out in Washington state, hiking such nice places as Mt. Rainier and Mt. St. Helens. As such, my posting will be light during the day. I will try and catch up in the evening.
The Chinese have completed assembly of Tiangong 1 (Heavenly Palace), their first space station module due to be launched in 2011.
Freedom of speech alert: Before they backed down, Glen Beck was told by attorneys at the Kennedy Center that he was forbidden to pray during an event he was hosting there. To quote Beck:
GLENN BECK: They have told people on the steps of the Supreme Court that they cannot pray there. They have told students on the steps of the Lincoln Memorial they can’t sing the National Anthem there. And last week I was told by the Kennedy Center that we could not pray there. We were told by the Kennedy Center in no uncertain terms that we could hold our event there, sure we had a contract. But they weren’t told that we were going to have an opening prayer. The program is has the word divine in it, our divine destiny. We couldn’t pray at the Kennedy Center. So my attorneys came to me and said, Glenn, are you willing to compromise on it? And I said, I sure am. You tell them that not only will I do an opening prayer, I’ll do a closing prayer, and the entire program may be a prayer. In fact, take this down. It is a night of prayer. You’ll see if you are lucky enough to get a ticket to the Kennedy Center, and they are not for sale. You will see in the program how I described it. I described it that way. So they could print that in their program at the Kennedy Center which they insisted on having after they told us we couldn’t pray. I said, let me dictate this one. Friday night I was supposed to have a meeting today at 1:00 with their attorneys and I had already talked to my attorneys. Zero compromise. We asked them, where is that in your I didn’t see that in your rules and regulations. “It’s not written down.” No prayer at a federally funded building.
Friday night I think they got a hold of Common Sense. They alerted me Friday night that they will allow prayer to happen on the stage of the Kennedy Center. I told them, thank you so much for your graciousness. I appreciate the scrap from the table. America, our religion and our faith is under attack and whether people care to realize it or not, it is.
In this Los Angeles Times profile just before his 90th birthday on August 22, Ray Bradbury tells it like it is. Some key quotes:
We should never have left [the Moon]. We should go to the moon and prepare a base to fire a rocket off to Mars and then go to Mars and colonize Mars. Then when we do that, we will live forever.
I think our country is in need of a revolution. There is too much government today. We’ve got to remember the government should be by the people, of the people and for the people.
We have too many cellphones. We’ve got too many Internets. We have got to get rid of those machines. We have too many machines now.
This space.com report by Tariq Malik gives a good overview of today’s successful spacewalk on ISS.
Senator Bill Nelson (D-Florida) is proposing giving tax breaks to space related businesses located in “five regional business enterprise zones.”
An unidentified administrator of the University of Michigan space engineering program has some interesting thoughts on why SpaceX has been so successful. Key quote:
I recently performed an analysis of the very best students in my space engineering programs over the past decade, based on their scholarly, leadership and entrepreneurial performance at Michigan. To my amazement, I found that of my top 10 students, five work at SpaceX. No other company or lab has attracted more than two of these top students.
I also noticed that SpaceX recruited only two of them directly from the university. The others were drawn to the company after some years of experience elsewhere—joining SpaceX despite lower salaries and longer work hours. Why do they leave successful jobs in big companies to join a risky space startup? A former student told me, “This is a place where I am the limiting factor, not my work environment.” At SpaceX, he considers himself to be in an entrepreneurial environment in which great young people collaborate to do amazing things. He never felt like this in his previous job with an aerospace company.
The spacewalk on ISS is not quite finished, but the astronauts are wrapping up after successfully installing the replacement pump to the cooling system. Ground controllers have tested the system and it appears to be working.
Speaking of the Sun, on August 14 it unleashed the first solar radiation storm of new solar cycle 24.
Boeing is hoping to do the first test flight of its privately developed cargo/crew capsule by late in 2013.
NASA managers have delayed by one day the next spacewalk to repair ISS’s cooling system. Now set for August 16, this spacewalk will install the new pump. The date of a fourth spacewalk to finish up the work is as yet unscheduled.
The Japanese are considering upgrades to their unmanned HTV freighter that carries cargo to ISS. The upgrades would allow HTV to return large cargo to Earth, as well as possibly become a manned vehicle.
The continuing cost overruns for the James Webb Space Telescope threaten future space science missions, according to NASA, even as astronomers are about to announce their recommendations for what NASA should do in the next decade. Note that I will be attending the 11 am press conference on the new decadal survey, and hope to post from there.
Scientists think they have discovered at least one cause of the recent long and deep solar minimum: a change in how plasma near the surface of the Sun flows from the equator to the pole, sinks, and then flows back to the equator. In the last minimum, this meridional current flowed much slower, while also flowing much closer to the pole before finally sinking.
An object, initially announced in 1998 to be the first planet ever photographed, then rejected as a planet when data suggested it was too hot, is now being resurrected as a possible planet. Key quote by Adam Burrows of Princeton University:
[If true] this would punctuate one of the strangest episodes in the history of the emerging field of exoplanet research. If false, it would be one more warning that numerous pitfalls await the intrepid astronomer in search of planetary gold beyond the solar system.
Willis Eschenbach at WattsUpWithThat has once again discovered serious questions about the climate temperature data produced by the Goddard Institute of Space Studies (GISS).
Two interesting astronomy stories in today’s Science magazine:
Volunteers, using their home computers, have helped discover a previously unknown pulsar.
Scientists, using telescopes, have discovered a previoulsy unknown asteroid in one of the Trojan points of the orbit of Neptune.
The annual Perseid meteor shower is expected to peak tonight and tomorrow, and Alan Boyle at Cosmic Log has some good tips for the best way to not only view it, but to hear it as well!
With the success of yesterday’s spacewalk, NASA engineers have revamped their remaining spacewalk plans for replacing that failed pump. The third spacewalk has been moved from Sunday to Monday to give everyone more time to prepare, and they are now planning a fourth spacewalk after that to finish things up.
