Mars
Station in the Arctic going online.
The Mars
Society now has Discovery.com
as a sponsor for its research station in the Haughton Crater on
Devon Island, Canada. The location is considered one of the closest
analogues on earth to the Mars environment. Discovery.com will begin
broadcasting weekly TV reports starting in July about the Flashline
Arctic Station
, named for the first project sponsor - Flashline.com
, and daily webcasts during the summer period when the research
station is occupied.
The station will
act as "a laboratory for learning how to live and work on Mars,
offering researchers the opportunity to conduct systematic studies
of the strategies, technologies, human factors and hardware designs
necessary to prepare for the human exploration of Mars. " -
Mars Society announcement.
Discovery
Channel To Sponsor Flashline Mars Arctic Research Station - Press
release - June.21.00
[--Error
[--Time Out--]--]Tour the site with a simulation program
developed by students at the Univ. of Colorado.
June
20, 2000
Russian commercial spysat opens for business. Sovinformsputnik
now competes with Space Imaging
in offering for sale 1 meter resolution
images of just
about any place on earth. Samples of the 1m imagery include sharp
views of Los
Angeles and
New York City .
Rocket
Guy to blast off next year on
a hydrogen peroxide
rocket . Brian Walker is a successful toy
inventor who is now building his own rocket that he hopes to
ride to an altitude of 30miles. Assuming it passes FAA inspections,
his launch is scheduled for April 2001. Oregon's
rocket man - OregonLive - June.18.00. [Seattle
Times: Inventor building rocket in back yard - Seattle Times - June.24.00 ]
News
briefs...Follow
the daily experiences of a Discovery.com journalist as he undergoes
Russian Space Camp cosmonaut training... Sailors
in the Newport-to-Bermuda race now rely on satellite maps to find
the fastest route. Jenifer
Clark's Gulfstream provides detailed weather and water temperature
plots from satellite date that help the ships avoid eddies and find
the fast currents to speed their travels. Satellites
Guide Sailors to Bermuda - Space.com - June.20.00 .
June
16, 2000
Space
tourist to visit Mir. The Wall Street Journal revealed
today plans by a rich investment manager to visit Mir. Dennis Tito,
head of the Wilshire Associates money-management firm, is expected
soon to annnounce he is "willing to pay a fee of around $20 million
to become the station's first tourist."
Tito, who also
comes with a background in the space program (he worked on the Mariner
projects that send vehicles to Mars and Venus) said he used techniques
similar to the ones he uses in his financial analysis to come to
the conclusion that the chances of getting killed during the mission
were no higher than "chances of a man his age dying suddenly, from
whatever cause ..."
The article gave
an interesting background history of MirCorp
, which has paid to revive Mir and will oversee Tito's trip. Space
Frontier Foundations's Rick N. Tumlinson was the central player
who convinced billionaire Walt Anderson that commercializing Mir
was feasible. They strengthened their efforts by getting the Indian
telecom billionaire Chirinjeev Kathuria to join them. Negotiations
with the Russians were tough, they had been burned by the fiasco
with Peter Llewllyn, but eventually got an agreement that created
MirCorp - owned 60% by Energia.
There was also
a discussion of the financial viability of the company, which is
quite serious about becoming a publicly traded enterprise. Separate
analyses carried out by the accounting firms KPMG and McKinsey &
Co. indicate possible revenues in the hundreds of millions per year
from tourism, entertainment, media and scientific markets.
Space
Buffs Attempt to Make Their Mir Tourist Venture Fly - Wall Street
Journal - June.16.2000 - (paid subscription required). See also
RadioShack
sponsors lunar rover . LunaCorp
has announced that RadioShack will be a corporate sponsor for its
Lunar rover project. The mission will be launched in 2003.
The mission to
one of the lunar polar regions (the PR doesn't say which one) will
explore for signs of water ice. The rover is designed by Dr. Red
Whittaker, from the well known Robotics Institute of Carnegie Mellon
University in Pittsburgh.
Interestingly,
it will continually move along a "polar circle" so that it will
always remain in sunlight during the lunar day. This simplifies
both the solar power requirements and the thermal management.
The Radio Shack
funding, however, will not be sufficient. They will hope to raise
funding from additional corporate sponsors plus "..exclusive television
contracts, fees from an Internet portal, ticket sales at science
centers offering motion-platform 'telepresence chambers'' linked
to the robot, and contracts with government space agencies.
Note that this
may include opportunities for members of the public, for a fee,
to drive the rover.
For more info
see the press release: [--Link Dead--]LunaCorp
Launches Plan for Multimedia Moon Robot - Yahoo press release- June.15.00 and
articles at
Also, for info
on lunar ice, see The
Lunar Prospector's crash landing on the moon uncovered evidence
of hydrogen and possible water on the satellite's surface - Space.com
- June.14.00 .
SkyCorp
to fly an Apple Macintosh G4 computer
in an experimental satellite next year. It will be deployed from
the space shuttle. The computer will act as a web server that can
be accessed as the sat passes in range via wireless networking protocols,
including a variant of Apple's existing AirPort wireless networking
technology.
The project, announced
at the recent Silicon
Valley Space Enterprise Symposium , is mainly intended as a test
for SkyCorp's plans to assemble and deploy satellites at the Space
Station. Such a technique may allow for a much cheaper Teledesic
type of broadband internet constellation.
See article at
Company to
Fly First Web Server in Space - SpaceViews - June.11.00 .
Also, read more
about SkyCorp's plans at Internet
Satellites Going Cheap - Wired - June.14.00 .
Note:
As reported below , the [--Error--]OMNI
Web Server ran internet packets through the UoSat-12
microsat back in the Spring and has recently run an ftp server on
the satellite that provided images from the satellite's camera.
So the SkyCorp sat will not be the first
Web Server in space. However, it will probably be the first to take
an off-the-shelf "server" computer and put into space.
These systems
will become the first building blocks of the proposed
Interplanetary
Internet .
June
11, 2000
Dreamtime
to Open Space Station
Media Center. In an agreement
with NASA , the startup company Dreamtime
will provide high definition TV from space shuttles and the International
Space Station.(NASA,
DREAMTIME PARTNERSHIP PROPELS SPACE INFORMATION AGE TO NEW HEIGHTS
- NASA Press Release - June.2.00 )
Dreamtime will
also be given access to NASA's vast image, audio, and video files,
as well as documents and blueprints, so that it can digitize 10-20%
of them. It will then create a portal site to provide public
access to this digital archive - Marshall
to digitize film archives - Huntsville Times - June.6.00 .
However, other
companies will also be competing in the space media arena. SpaceHab
announced last December that it would collaborate with a Russian
company to build its own commercial module "Enterprise "
for the ISS. It's spinoff company called SpaceMedia would run a
webcasting site on the module to provide space imagery, news, infor,
etc.
Meanwhile, MirCorp
has similar plans for the Mir space station (see below ).
If it can raise funding for additional missions, it wants to develop
Mir also for TV broadcasting, movie making, etc.
Dreamtime
May Face Stiff Competition - SpaceViews - June.3.00
News
briefs...Listen in
to Astronomy
Rock Radio at MP3.com for the latest rocking sounds from
the Cosmos...Check out Rand
Simberg 's report on the potential of space tourism - Near-Term
Prospects For Space Tourism . Covers near term possibilities
such as parabolic
(weightless) aircraft flights , high
altitude flights , and sub-orbital
trips .
May
24, 2000
Moon
business rising. LunarCorp
is expected to announce funding from a major corporate sponsor for
its lunar rover
project. Space.com reports (LunaCorp
Gets Corporate Backing for Moon Mission-May.23.00) that a press
conference on June 15 will reveal the Fortune 500 company that is
making a substantial investment in the project.
However, additional funding
will be needed to launch the rover in 2003. The robotic explorer
will allow earthbound controllers to direct its movements around
a region at the Moon's south lunar pole. In particular, it's hoped
that more evidence for water ice will be found.
Another company, TransOrbital ,
hopes to send a craft to orbit the Moon in 2001. The $15 million
dollar craft will orbit the moon for 3 months while returning video
of the surface. It will then crash into the surface.
Take Your Business to the Moon - Space.com - May.23.00 .
On board will be partial cremated
human remains intended for a lunar burial. (Firm
offers Moon burial - BBC News - May.9.00 ). Further business
will be done by selling rides for small items like notes or rings.
An [--Error--]auction at eBay for a
business card ride is currently bid at $1100. [Final bid was $2600.
- May.27.00]
Perhaps
amateur satellite builders will go lunar as well.
Following in the tradition of the Amsats
, Martin Reeves proposes - [--Link Dead--]ARTeMiS
Reaches for the Moon! - that an amateur radio satellite be
placed on the moon. The "ARTeMiS" (AMATEUR RADIO TRANSPONDER MOON
SYSTEM) solar powered lander could use a radio system similar to
that used on the current OSCAR amsats to send slow scan video of
the lunar surface during the two week daylight periods.
Help
Name the Craters on Eros!
- the NEAR spacecraft is currently
orbiting the asteroid Eros and returning the first detailed pictures
of the surface. The Planetary
Society is organizing this contest to name the craters. Submit
your suggestions.
Space
Tourism starts in a Mig.
A recent article in the LA Times reports that the company Space
Adventures hopes to offer suborbital flights in a few
years but is doing well in the meantime with its jet fighter rides.
The company offers
"...jaunts inside the
cockpit of a Russian MiG-25 military jet. More than 4,500 people
have paid $11,900 for the trip, which tops out at 85,000 feet.
An additional 1,200 are on a waiting list for an eventual trip
to the moon." - [--Link Dead--]Space--
Tourism's Hot Ticket - LA Times - May.22.00
There is clearly a market for
commercial space rides, though a pricey one. See also the
Space
Tourism section.
News
briefs...A Danish
TV game show will offer a trip to space as the grand prize. A reservation
with Space
Adventures will guarantee a seat on their sub-orbital
vehicle as soon as it is up and running. See Game
Show Aims to Make Space the Final Answer - Space.com - May.22.00
...
May
18, 2000
High
school students remotely control rover
in desert trial of Mars prototype. Several students groups in the
US as well Denmark will control a JPL rover from their schools as
it explores a site in Nevada.
FIDO
the robot weighs 70kg and is about twice the size of the Mars Pathfinder
rover. It's movements can be programmed remotely but it also has
onboard intelligence such as the ability to avoid obstacles.
For more info
see Students
take the leash as FIDO heads back to the desert - JPL Press Release
- May.16.00 * Students
control a prototype Mars rover - Space Science News - May.17.00
* Lapis in Future
- Rovers Section .
News
briefs....The
Mars Song Contest results are in. See finalists list: [--Error--]Rouget
de Lisle Contest Results - Mars Society bulletin - May.1.00.
May
5, 2000
ISADORA
Module would
provide a "multi-purpose studio for the Arts where artists
will be able to experiment and create in Earth's orbit."
Visitors would
include "choreographers, poets, filmmakers, writers, sculptors,
installation artists, musicians etc?" who would experience
the Space environment and communicate their impressions to the world
through their creative work on the station.
If you have suggestions
or proposals for artistic activities on the Isadora Module, fill
out the questionaire - Wanna Create Art in
Space? .
See also the Space
Art page, some suggestions in the Future
section, and the article - Can
Art Break Science's Monopoly Grip on Space?- Space.com-Apr.23.00
May 3, 2000
Class
S*T*A*R*S participate in shuttle experiments. Spacehab
created the STARS (Space
Technology and Research Students) program to provide students around
the world with the opportunity to interact with experiments happening
in real-time in Space. Grades 4, 7 and 10 are targeted but other
levels can participate as well. [--Link Dead--]Spacehab
press release - April.6.00.
Initially the
experiments will run during Space Shuttle flights. Later they will
be located on the International
Space Station in the commercial module Enterprise
that Spacehab is developing.
The experiments
will be selected from student proposals and launched for a discount
price in the Spacehab storage modules. Schools can purchase [--Link
Dead--]packages for $300 that include workbooks, an in-class
version of the experiment, and other resources. Students will observe
the experiments live over the internet.
Shuttle flight
STS-107 in the Spring of 2001 will include a US [--Link
Dead--]biosphere experiment, an Israeli chemical garden experiment,
a Chinese silkworm experiment and an Australian spider web experiment.
The schools with the winning experiments must raise money from sponsors
to help pay the launch costs.
Genesis-Gram
will
be engraved on a microchip that will ride on the NASA's Genesis
spacecraft. This probe will fly through the Solar Wind and pick
up samples for return to earth. You must compress your profundity
to 100 characters or less.
See the Tourism
section for more opportunities for Token Space travel.
Graduating
class poses for spysat. This year's Air Force Academy graduating
class hopes that Space
Imaging 's Ikonos commercial spysat will spot them for a spectacular
class photo. The 1m precision of the imager should easily find them
if it is not a cloudy day. [--Error--]Ikonos,
U.S. Air Force Academy Team Up For Special Photo - AviationNow -
May.1.00 .
Clinton
boosts your GPS receiver accuracy. The signals from the
Global Positioning Satellites have been encrypted such that
only the US military can obtain the best location precision. However,
ground based broadcast of correction signals has allowed civilian
systems, particularly those on commercial aircraft, to obtain even
sub-meter precision (This is called differential GPS.)
Because of this
and because the military say they now know how to jam the signals
to an opponent during a conflict, the President has ordered that
the signals no longer be smeared as of this week.
This means that
the 2 million or so basic GPS receivers now in consumer hands have
improved from 100m or so location accuracy to 10s of meters.
[--Error--]U.S.
To Stop Degrading GPS Signal- AviationNow - May.1.00
SETI@home
approaches
2 million participants. The organizers originally expected
that a maximum of two hundred thousand or so people would allow
their PC's to run the SETI data analysis program. The program takes
advantage of free processing cycles by running as a screen saver
when the PC is not otherwise occupied.
The amazing popularity
indicates the great interest in SETI. Also, the possibility that
THE SIGNAL would be found on one's own machine has been a great
motivator.
The combined processing
power easily represents the most powerful multi-processing computer
ever created. The success of the project is inspiring scientists
in other fields with large processing challenges, e.g. genetics,
to develop similar programs.
The first
Internet router in Space was
demonstrated in April on the low earth orbiting UoSat-12 microsat.
Since it is in LEO, there are no time delay problems as with GEO
sats and "standard end-to-end IP connectivity has been established
all the way to the spacecraft". For more info see [--Error--]OMNI
Web Server at Goddard Spaceflight Center and the article
ScienceDaily
Magazine -- NASA Engineers Use Standard Internet Protocols To "Talk"
With A Satellite . [Ed. The title here originally said "..Internet
server.." but it's actually a router. June.11.00]
[Space
Surfing - Beyond 2000 - May.12.00 ]
Note: this has
implications for MirCorp
and Spacehab's commercial Enterprise
module, both of which plan to include onboard Internet servers for
webcasting and other online activities.
News
briefs....USA
Today had an article this week about amateurs contributing to science.
In particular, they discussed the amateur astronomers helping to
locate in the visible light range the gamma-ray
bursters that were detected by satellites. - [--Link
Dead--]Backyard scientists adding a wealth of data - USA Today -
May.2.00 ...
...Enter the Hubble
Image contest to decide where to point the Hubble in August. The
Hubble Heritage Project
, which maintains archives of Hubble images, is sponsoring this
contest. Send in your vote by June 6th.
Point the Hubble: Group Announces Image Contest-Space.com-May.2.00
April 22, 2000
Area
51 revealed by public spysats. The
Air Force base, known to X-Files viewers and UFO buffs as the site
of super-secret aircraft development, can now be seen in photos
taken by a Russian satellite for Aerial
Images of Raleigh, North Carolina and available at TerraServer
. See [--Error--]Satellite
Images Of Secret Area 51 Published - AviationNow - Apr.18.00
.
The images are
taken at 2m resolution. There is no indication that the 1m capable
Ikonos commercial satellite at Space Imaging will be providing better
views. However, several new commericial spysats will be going to
orbit in the next couple of years. So one can expect that there
will be no site on earth that can hide from their view.
When this news
was revealed the service was soon overwhelmed by hits. Later a hacker
damaged the site and it was down for a couple of days.
[April 23, 2000
- Higher resolutions images from Space Imaging's Ikonos satellite
are now on display at Space.com - Most
Detailed Images Ever of Top-Secret U.S. Air Base Show Major Expansion
]
News
briefs...Microsoft
is creating an astronomy image server with a huge database similar
to its Terraserver
, which provides access to satellite images of earth. The SkyServer
will access terabytes of data from sources such as the Sloan
Digital Survey -see The
Cosmos Is Coming - Wired - April 17.00 ....
A hardcopy version
of Space.com will be published next year on a bi-monthly basis -
[--Link Dead--]SPACE.com Announces the Launch
of SPACE.com Illustrated ...
May 4th will be
Space Day and around the
US there will be events to mark the importance of Space exploration.
An online 3 hour celebration at the Smithsonian Air & Space
Museum will be [--Link Dead--]broadcast over
the web - [--Link Dead--]Cyber Space
Day Webcast announcement ...
Effort to organize
protection for the Apollo landing sites has begun. Remote controlled
rovers and eventually human visitors could disturb the sites. See
Don't
Tread on Me: Group Wants to Protect Apollo Site - Space.com - April
18,2000 ....
April 14, 2000
Amateur
astronomers become high-energized. There
are few areas in astronomy, it seems, in which amateurs cannot participate.
Even in the exotic areas of x-ray and gamma ray astronomy, amateur
astronomers help spot flares in the visible light to alert astronomers
to look at those areas for signs of outbursts in the high energy
light scales. Amateurs and pros met this week in Huntsville Alabama
to discuss how that can better cooperate - The
High Energy Astrophysics Workshop for Amateurs - Space Science News
- Apr.12.00 [Amateurs
Reach for the Stars - Space Science News - Apr.21.00 ]
- See also the Space
Science page.
News
briefs...Some
Penn State students are doing their part to support the ISS program
with logo designs: Penn
State students work with NASA to promote international space station
- Excite News - Apr.5.00 .
April 9, 2000
Mir
re-activated by Space activist. Rick
Tumlinson of the Space
Frontier Foundation has been one of the driving forces
behind the effort to save and commercialize the Mir space station.
He led the negotiations with the Russian space officials and convinced
the telcom mogul Walt Anderson to help fund MirCorp (www.mirstation.com
), which now also includes the Russian company Energia and several
other investors. For more about Tumlinson and the story of Mir's
resurrection, see The
Men Behind Mir's Financial Rescue - Space.com - Apr.7.00
MirCorp has signed
a lease for the station and hopes to use the station for various
commercial ventures. The initial funding paid for the current mission
of two cosmonauts who docked
with the station on April 6 . They will try to get the station
back in working shape and, in particular, seal a slow leak that
is draining the air from the ship.
This week it was
also announced that funding is sufficient to send a second mission
this fall. MirCorp
Miracle Continues: Announces September Mission To Station- Space.com
- Apr.6.00 .
For more information
see:
British
Mars mission will rely on public involvement. The
British Beagle
2 micro-lander will be carried to Mars by ESA's Mars
Express spacecraft. The two part system of an orbiter and lander
will be launched in the summmer of 2003 and will arrive at Mars
in December of that year. The Beagle 2 will separate and land on
the surface and begin a set of tests for signs of microbial life.
To help fund the
construction and ground support for the project, the public relations
company M&C Saatchi Sponsorship has been hired to help raise
£10 million from a "a mix of sponsorship, merchandising, and
public participation." Based partly on the huge interest in
the Mars Pathfinder landing (its website recieved millions of hits),
they expect to obtain lots of positive response from the public.
M&C
Saatchi / Beagle 2 press release .
Note that the
lander already plans to include a [--Link
Dead--]song from the rock group Blur for broadcast from
the lander and [--Error--]artwork
from Damien Hirst .
News
briefs...A
recent effort by an amateur rocket group to set the high altitude
record suffered various problems. See reports at JP
Aerospace and at [--Link Dead--]Glitches Mar Amateur
Space Shot - Space.com - Mar.28.00 .
March 14, 2000
Bentspace
currently
is sending messages of up to 1000
words for free to a star randomly selected by their radio antenna.
More about Token
Space Travel on Tourism
page.....
Students can enter
the Mars Youth Society's Hakluyt
Contest 2000 to win a free trip to their convention in Toronto.
The best letter to a political letter in support of Mars exploration
will win. See more space competitions on the Contests
page.
February 26, 2000
News
briefs....Watch
the Liberty Bell 7 restoration at [--Link
Dead--]Kansas Cosmosphere and
Space Center via [--Link
Dead--]Discovery Online -- Space Cams: Liberty Bell 7 Cam
....
MIT students propose
a low budget airplane for Mars - SpaceViews
Article: Can Students Resurrect the Mars Airplane?-Feb.25.00
...
Give a name to
the new set of 4 satellites that will measure space weather - The
Cluster II competition - "Name the Cluster quartet"
February 18, 2000
The
Mir Hotel & Industrial Park opens for business...MirCorp
, a collaboration of RSC Energia - a Russian state-owned space company
- and western investment firms, signed a lease this week for the
Mir space station.
Their first priority
is to find companies who want to do microgravity R&D in such
areas as protein crystal growth. Also being discussed is the filming
of a movie on board the station.
But they will
also gladly provide lodging to tourists who can afford the $20M
or so for a room with a view....
News
briefs...If
you thought rocket scientists were just boring nerds, read the Salon.com
article "Sex
and Rockets ". It discusses the amazing life of JPL co-founder
and occultist Jack Parsons....
..the student
satellite Starshine will be falling to earth today or tomorrow.
The project successfully involved thousands of young students in
tracking the satellite.
February 14, 2000
Students
Photograph the Earth during STS-99. The
EarthKam
project involves students from the U.S., France, Germany and Japan
who use the World Wide Web to direct a digital camera flown on the
Space Shuttle. These photographs are used to enhance their "learning
in Earth and space science, social studies, geography, mathematics,
and more."
*[--Time
Out--]EarthKam STS-99 control center webcast
* [--Link Dead--] Yahoo - Space Shuttle Images
of Earth to Reside On 3Com e-Network for Internet Age Education-Feb.11.00
*[--Link
Dead--] Students to Use Shuttle Camera to Spy On Earth - Space.com
- Feb.11.00
News
briefs...The
current Scientific
American has a special report called Mars
or Bust discussing Manned missions to Mars. Includes many interesting
articles by Robert Zubrin. Buzz Aldrin and others about the challenges
and possibilities of such projects...Read about the latest X-33
developments in RLV News
...If you have your 3-D stereo glasses handy, take a peek at the
3D
view of a Mars canyon provided by Malin
Space Science Systems ..
February 3, 2000
StenSat
was
built by Ham radio enthusiasts in the Washington D.C area.
It is riding inside
mothership satellite called Opal
, designed and built by graduate students at Stanford University.
This satellite will soon release 6 small satellites in a test of
formation flying in space.
[--Link Dead--]Super-small Satellite Mission Succeeding - Space.com
- Feb.1.00.
Rove
the Antarctic with Nomad in search of meteorites. Nomad
is an autonomous robot that will use its own onboard intelligence
to locate meteorites lying on the surface of an ice field. It was
built by a team at Carnegie-Mellon University and sponsored by NASA.
Experience with Nomad will help with building rovers for Mars exploration.
The BigSignal
site provides introductory info on the project. There is a section
there that explains why
the Antarctic is a great place to find meteorites .
There is also
an elaborate
interface program that allows you to see the latest images from
the robot and examine the meteorites found so far.
Robotic
Antarctic Meteorite Search site provides more technical information
and recent data from the rover.
As of Februrary
5 Nomad had correctly identified 5 meteorites on its own.
News
briefs...If
you live in or will be visiting a country in the northern latitudes,
you should try to see the beautiful Aurora (or Northern Lights).
To find out if they will be visible, check the current Aurora
forecast at Intellicast.
...Intellicast
also provides viewing
forecasts for astronomers in a project in cooperation with the
[--Error--]Earth & Sky
astronomy radio program.
January 29, 2000
Spacehab
to build web-base on the Space Station.
A
$100M commercial module to built by Spacehab and its Russian partners
will be used for a number of applications such as microgravity research.
One of its primary functions will also be as a space based website
and television broadcasting station:
" 'Among our new businesses
will be the first independent commercial television and Internet
Web-site broadcasts from space,' said Dr. Shelley Harrison, SPACEHAB's
Chairman. 'We will also expand our highly successful
S*T*A*R*S space and science education program from
the Space Shuttle to Enterprise, targeting millions of youngsters
around the world' "
News
brief...A spectacular
meteor flash over Alaska was seen by many in the state on Jan. 18.
NASA later sent a plane to take samples of extraterrestrial material
that remained floating in the air. Ewald Lemke, a 63-year-old realtor,
was alert enough to take several striking pictures of the large
trail left by the explosion. See Yukon
Meteor Flash Caught on Film - Space.com - Jan.28.00 and
also the pictures at Lemke's
own site .
January 27, 2000
Radio
astronomy in your high school.
The Radio
Jove project at NASA & the University of Florida
offers low priced (~$100) radio telescope kits that can be assembled
by students. Students use the telescopes to collect planetary and
solar radio astronomy data, obtaining hands-on experience in gathering
and working with space science data. The initial project involves
observing radio emissions from Jupiter.
See the HobbySpace
Amateur
Radio Astronomy section , and
Students
construct radio telescope - Penn State Collegian-Jan.25.00
January 14, 2000
Mir
recieves private funds. An
investment venture, pursuing tourism and other commercial space
business such as satellite launch and repair, has sent money to
the Russia space program to help fund a mission to keep Mir from
falling back to earth. Part of the project involves attaching a
solar powered space
tether to provide a permanent system for attitude
control.
For more info
see:
FAS
uses commercial spysat to examine North Korean launch site. Space
Imaging 's new Ikonos satellite now provides 1-m resolution images
of many parts of the world for as low as $10 a shot. The Federation
of American Scientists (FAS) has recently used Iknonos images of
a North Korean missile test site. These are the first high resolution
images of the site available to the public. The FAS has posted their
analysis
of the site using these images. (Note that others looking at the
same images come to far different conclusions about North Korean
missile capabilities.)
This is the first
example of how private citizens and groups can take advantage of
these private spysats to find out independently of the government
what is happening in previously inaccessible trouble spots. See
Eyes
in the Sky section for more info on obtaining satellite
images.
[[--Link Dead--]Commercial
Images Detail North Korean Missile Site - Aviation Week - Jan.17.00]
Mars
and Beyond series
webcast on new Sci-Fi network.
Majel Barrett, wife of
the late Gene Roddenberry and participant in both the original Star
Trek and the Next Generation series, will play a supporting role.
The show's
premise seems to mix space exploration with an X-Files
type conspiracy.
The Cyber
Sci-Fi Network will use web streaming technology to broadcast
shows over the web.
Popular
NASA
Space Science News site
canceled. Despite
a Webby
Award and other accolades, NASA Marshall Spaceflight
Center announced on Jan. 7 that support for the site would be terminated.
The site presented
NASA science in a manner that was both understandable and fun to
a wide audience. Also, it encouraged amateur involvement in such
areas as observation of meteor showers and lunar occultations. A
mailing list of over 150,000 notified subscribers of the latest
progress in space science and in upcoming events.
Protests from
many sources, including Lou Dobbs of Space.com
, has apparently convinced MSFC to postpone
the termination while it looks for funds to continue it.
Currently, web
pages are still online (thankfully since HobbySpace
has many links to their site). Also, SpaceRef.com
has created an archive
of the site.
[Wherefore
art thou, Science@NASA? - Jan.15.00 - current status]
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