Private SpaceX Capsule Brings Big Science to Space Station

The NanoRacks Plate Reader, shown here, will enable in orbit analysis of research samples for certain studies aboard the International Space Station.  CREDIT: NASA


The International Space Station is now home to more than 1,200 pounds (544 kilograms) of supplies delivered by an unmanned, privately built space capsule that reached the orbiting science laboratory on Sunday (March 3).

Among the goods SpaceX's Dragon capsule transported to the station were science experiments primed and ready for the six international residents of the space station.

"Dragon is scheduled to return to Earth on March 25, bringing home nearly double the amount of supplies it brought up, about 2,668 pounds (1,210 kilograms)," NASA officials said in a statement. "Returning investigation samples will demonstrate how life in microgravity affects the growth of plant seedlings, changes to the human body, the behavior of semiconductors and detergents, and more."

Some of the experiments will only stay on board for three weeks, making a round trip back to Earth with Dragon when the capsule detaches from the station. One of those experiments involves thale cress, a plant used in many experiments because of its small, relatively easy-to-map genome.

Scientists affiliated with NASA and the European Space Agency sent up one experiment called "Seedling Growth-1," designed to investigate how well plants grow amid stresses such as low oxygen. [See video of SpaceX's Dragon docking in orbit]

"The experiment will study how plants adapt to micro- and low-gravity environments," NASA officials wrote in a statement. "Researchers hope to determine the ability of vegetation to provide a complete, sustainable, dependable and economical means for human life-support in space."

Beyond helping scientists learn how to grow food in space, the research might contribute to better agricultural practices back on Earth. Understanding how these plants react to a stressful environment could lend insight into how farmers could mitigate those taxing situations back on the planet's surface.

Some of the experiments sent to the International Space Station will play a role in education, as well.

"Students from several California schools developed investigations to study bacteria, iron corrosion, battery performance and carbon dioxide levels aboard the station, all of which will be delivered by Dragon," NASA officials wrote in a statement.

Personal product manufacturer Procter & Gamble sent up another experiment that will study how to better preserve toothpaste, gels and creams.

"Particle additives can make a product last longer by maintaining its consistency, but they sink and clump together after a certain amount of time, which can spoil a product," NASA officials said. "It's difficult to study these dynamics on Earth because gravity gets in the way, making the space station an ideal research platform for these important industrial processes."

Although Dragon's launch went flawlessly, once the capsule parted from the Falcon 9 rocket used to boost it into orbit, one glitch became apparent. A thruster problem delayed Dragon's approach to the space station by a day. The spacecraft is expected to return to Earth with experiment results and other gear on March 25.

Dragon also brought a few treats for the astronauts, with bananas and apples among the first items unloaded to the space station.

- Space.com

How to Tell Time Like a Meteorologist - By Dan Stillman

A weather observation isn't very useful without knowing what time it was made, nor is a forecast map very helpful without knowing what time the forecast is for. So before we start looking at all those meteorological maps and numbers, we'd be wise to understand the zany way meteorologists keep time.

Keep reading to learn about meteorologists and the zany way they keep time. Graphic courtesy U.S. Department of Health and Human Services.

Almost all meteorological information is tracked and reported using a standard time called Coordinated Universal Time (UTC), which is also known as Zulu (Z) time (and used to be known as Greenwich Mean Time, or GMT). This is why you'll here meteorologists and weather enthusiasts talk to each other in what sounds like secret code -- "12Z NAM" or "0Z GFS," for example -- if you're lucky (or unlucky?) enough to listen in on such a conversation. "12Z" and "0Z" simply refer to particular times, while "NAM" and "GFS" are acronyms for computer weather models (a subject for a later post).

The UTC or Z day starts at 0000 (i.e., 00UTC or 00Z), which is midnight along the 0° longitude line (which runs through Greenwich, England) and 7 p.m. Eastern Standard Time the previous day, and counts upward to 2359 hours in military style. In other words, 00Z Monday is 7 p.m. Sunday (EST). To convert from UTC or Z to your local time, you subtract the number of hours shown for your time zone...

EST: Subtract 5 hours
CST: Subtract 6 hours
MST: Subtract 7 hours
PST: Subtract 8 hours

... which gives you your local time in military (24-hour) format. To make things even more confusing, you subtract one hour less during daylight saving time.

The four most meteorologically important times are 00Z, 6Z, 12Z and 18Z. These are the most common times that computer weather models are run and that their forecast maps show information for. Still not sure how to convert from UTC/Z to local time? Let's spell it out more clearly with this cheat sheet...

00Z minus 5 = 1900 hrs = 7 p.m. EST (8 p.m EDT) the previous day
06Z minus 5 = 0100 hrs = 1 a.m. EST (2 a.m. EDT)
12Z minus 5 = 0700 hrs = 7 a.m. EST (8 a.m. EDT)
18Z minus 5 = 1300 hrs = 1 p.m. EST (2 p.m. EDT)

See more about the history of UTC/GMT/Z here, and below for a full conversion table.

- Dan Stillman 

 


SAWDOS: - African Time Zones:

SAST – South Africa Standard Time

Time zone offset: UTC + 2 hours

SAST is 2 hours ahead of Coordinated Universal Time (UTC)

Time zone abbreviation: SAST

Full name is South Africa Standard Time

Where and when is SAST observed?

SAST is used all year

• Lesotho
• South Africa
• Swaziland

Example location in SAST

• Johannesburg - This time zone offset is used all year in this location

Other time zones in Africa

Go directly through the links below, or see the Africa time zone list

• CAT - Central Africa Time
• CET - Central European Time
• CVT - Cape Verde Time
• EAT - Eastern Africa Time
• EEST - Eastern European Summer Time
• EET - Eastern European Time
• GMT - Greenwich Mean Time
• MUT - Mauritius Time
• RET - Reunion Time
• SCT - Seychelles Time
• WAST - West Africa Summer Time
• WAT - West Africa Time
• WEST - Western European Summer Time
• WET - Western European Time
• WST - Western Sahara Summer Time
• WT - Western Sahara Standard Time

- TimeandDate.com

American Meteorological Society focuses on the future

Poster presenters are explaining what they researched and what they found in their particular studies. Great way to collaborate with other scientists in the field of meteorology. Image Credit: Matt Daniel

The 93rd American Meteorological Society is hosting its annual meeting in Austin, Texas this week from January 6-10, 2013. As mentioned in a previous post, the theme for this meeting is “Taking Predictions to the Next Level: Expanding Beyond Today’s Weather, Water, and Climate Forecasting and Projections”. I attended the 13th Presidential Forum which started up the meeting on Monday, January 7, 2013. In this forum, former President Dr. Louis Uccellini welcomed everyone for attending the annual meeting and discussed the importance of going above and beyond today’s weather and seeing how it can improve through advancements in science, social media, and how meteorologists can make a bigger impact on society. There have been numerous discussions on various papers that have been written for the past couple of days. There have been sessions discussing some of the most recent weather and climate events such as Hurricane Sandy that affected parts of the Caribbean and eastern United States, warming in the Arctic, and even talks regarding the April 27, 2011 tornado outbreak that killed hundreds across Alabama and the Southeast.

Dr. Louis Uccellini asked how will we look at the advancement of atmospheric sciences in the next 20 years? In the opening remarks of the 13th Presidential Forum, one of the distinguished guests such as Dr. Alan Thorpe, European Centre for Medium-Range Weather Forecasts (ECMWF) discussed the advancements in how much weather models have been improving over the decades. He explained how the physics in the computer models are more sophisticated and understand how our atmosphere is composed and works. He explained how the horizontal resolution of the ECMWF has come a long way since 1980. The smaller the resolution, the more details the models contains so we can use it to accurately forecast weather patterns. For instance, in 1980, the ECMWF had a resolution approximately at 210 kilometers. By 1999, resolution was around 25 kilometers. As of 2011, the horizontal resolution size has improved to 16 kilometers. In the future, it is our goal to be able to improve our forecast skill past one week and be able to look ahead at weeks two, three, and even a month out in time. Weather forecasts three days out are typically reliable, but once you get past seven days, we begin to obtain more uncertainties in our forecast. When it comes to weather models and forecasting the weather, Dr. Thorpe explained that we should strive to predict a season ahead in the extra tropics. Finally, he discussed that we should reduce AND quantify uncertainties which result in more accuracy and reliability. Other guest speakers included Major General Michael Walsh, US Army Corps of Engineers, Dr. Tony Hey, Microsoft Research, and Dr. Nigel Snoad, Google Crisis Response.

One of the best things about the annual AMS meeting is that scientists gather together in one spot to discuss the latest on studies, research, and ideas. This collaboration is vital for the scientific committee and to further pursue advances in science and discovery. Unfortunately, there are a lot of people from the government such as local forecasters at various National Weather Service offices that were unable to attend this meeting due to budget cuts (which I could probably write another large article about on it’s own!). One of the best ways to collaborate is during the poster sessions where you can read about and meet scientists who have researched a particular subject in their field of study. These sessions are one of the many benefits of having science gatherings across the United States. Collaboration is key.

One of the slides that were presented during the Sandy Town Hall Meeting on Monday, January 7, 2013.

On Monday night, there was a Town Hall Meeting discussing the impacts of Hurricane Sandy. This meeting discussed the predictions, warnings, and societal impacts and response regarding Hurricane Sandy as it transformed into a superstorm that brought flooding and storm surge along the Northeast, blizzard conditions across West Virginia, and downed trees across many states. The speakers for this event included Dr. Louis W. Uccellini, Richard Knabb (Director of the National Hurricane Center), David Novak (HPC), Melvyn A. Shapiro (NCAR), Bryan Norcross (The Weather Channel), Jason Samenow (Washington Post), and Eric Holthaus (The Wall Street Journal). Each speaker presented interesting facts regarding Sandy. Knabb and Novak complimented the great skills the ECMWF weather model did when it came to showing the development of Sandy. While others showed the science and amazing 3D visuals, others spoke about the impacts of social media. Jason Samenow of the Capital Weather Gang said that you need to know who you trust via social media and know who is a reliable source when it comes to getting factual information. He admits that the rumors of the flooding at the stock exchange got everyone, including the Weather Channel and the National Weather Service. In a day of social media, it only takes one source to spread a rumor and make others believe it is true.

Bottom line: The 93rd American Meteorological Society Annual Meeting in Austin, Texas has been a huge success in my opinion. Many people are here bringing various studies and research to the field that allows other scientists to collaborate, share, and express their opinions. I am impressed at the increase in student activity from various local chapters across the United States. After attending a few climate change discussions, I was pleased to see such a pouring of interest among students. I would say a third of the room was filled with people age 30 or younger. Overall, I think the meeting is going smoothly and appears to be a huge success. Shout out goes to Dr. Louis Uccellini and everyone on his committee for organizing another successful annual meeting in this beautiful city of Austin, Texas.

- EarthSky

Trial dissemination of Metop-B satellite data

EUMETSAT has begun trial dissemination of data from instruments on board the Metop-B polar-orbiting satellite to partners, including the European Centre for Medium-Range Weather Forecasts (ECMWF), Met Office (UK), Deutscher Wetterdienst and Météo-France.

The excellent data quality is in line with that achieved by Metop-A. This shows that Metop-B, launched on 17 September, is performing well and is on its way to replacing the ageing Metop-A as EUMETSAT’s prime operational satellite in polar orbit at the end of April 2013.

This trial dissemination now includes data from the following instruments:

Advanced Microwave Sounding Unit-A (AMSU-A): 28 September
Global Navigation Satellite System Receiver for Atmospheric Sounding (GRAS): 1 October
Microwave Humidity Sounder (MHS): 2 October
Advanced Very High Resolution Radiometer (AVHRR/3): 4 October for VIS channels, 16 October for infrared channels
Advanced Scatterometer (ASCAT): 23 October
High-Resolution Infrared Radiation Sounder (HIRS/4): 26 October

Trial dissemination of data from the GOME-2 and IASI instruments is planned to start in December-January as they require more calibration efforts.

The Metop-B instruments deliver measurements of the atmosphere, including temperature and humidity profiles, cloud properties, and greenhouse and trace gases such as ozone, carbon monoxide, and sulphur dioxide. The instruments also observe the ocean and continental surfaces, providing measurements of wind at the ocean surface, ice, snow and soil moisture.

Temperature and humidity profiles, wind at the ocean surface, and soil moisture are essential inputs to Numerical Weather Prediction (NWP) models, the basis of modern weather forecasting. The all-weather wind measurements provided by ASCAT are used worldwide to track mid-latitude storms and tropical cyclones.

About Metop

The Metop satellites are Europe’s first operational meteorological satellites in polar orbit. They constitute the space segment of the EUMETSAT Polar System (EPS) delivering data for numerical weather prediction (NWP) – the basis of modern weather forecasting – and climate and environmental monitoring.

Flying at an altitude of 817 km, each Metop satellite carries the same sophisticated suite of instruments providing fine-scale global data, which can only be gathered in the low Earth orbit, such as vertical profiles of atmospheric temperature and moisture, wind speed and direction at the ocean surface, and some atmospheric trace gases.

Observations from Metop-A have significantly improved weather forecasts up to 10 days ahead. These forecasts are essential to protect life and limit damage to property, but they also benefit the weather-sensitive sectors of the European economy, especially energy, transportation, construction, agriculture and tourism.

The three Metop satellites, launched sequentially, will provide continuous data until 2020. The first satellite, Metop-A, was launched in 2006, and the third and final satellite, Metop-C, is scheduled for launch at the end of 2017.

ESA is responsible for the development of the three Metop satellites, fulfilling user and system requirements defined by EUMETSAT. ESA also carries out operations for the Launch and Early Orbit Phase to place the satellites in polar orbit, before handing them over to EUMETSAT for commissioning and exploitation. EUMETSAT develops all ground systems required to deliver products and services to users and to respond to their evolving needs, procures launch services and operates the full system for the benefit of users.

The EPS programme is Europe’s contribution to the Initial Joint Polar System (IJPS), with the US National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA).

About EUMETSAT

The European Organisation for the Exploitation of Meteorological Satellites is an intergovernmental organisation based in Darmstadt, Germany, currently with 26 Member States (Austria, Belgium, Croatia, Czech Republic, Denmark, Finland, France, Germany, Greece, Hungary, Ireland, Italy, Latvia, Luxembourg, the Netherlands, Norway, Poland, Portugal, Romania, Slovakia, Slovenia, Spain, Sweden, Switzerland, Turkey and the United Kingdom) and five Cooperating States (Bulgaria, Estonia, Iceland, Lithuania, and Serbia).

EUMETSAT operates the geostationary satellites Meteosat-8 and -9 over Europe and Africa, and Meteosat-7 over the Indian Ocean. The third Meteosat Second Generation satellite, MSG-3, was launched on 5 July 2012 and will be renamed Meteosat-10 after commissioning is complete.

Metop-A, the first European polar-orbiting meteorological satellite, was launched in October 2006 and has been delivering operational data since 15 May 2007. It will be replaced by Metop-B, which was launched on 17 September 2012.

The Jason-2 ocean altimetry satellite, launched on 20 June 2008, added monitoring of sea state, ocean currents and sea level change to the missions EUMETSAT conducts.

The data and products from EUMETSAT’s satellites are vital to weather forecasting and make a significant contribution to the monitoring of environment and the global climate.

- Eumetsat

Teaterstuk: Wees bedag op rampe

Tydens 'n pittige industriële teaterstuk van die Wes-Kaapse Departement van Plaaslike Regering se Rampbestuursentrum, is die gevare van brande, weghol vure en vloede op interessante wyse aan die Powertown gemeenskap oorgedra. Foto: Nickey le Roux

SUID-KAAP NUUS - Die Wes-Kaapse Departement van Plaaslike Regering se provinsiale Rampbestuur Sentrum het 'n Vuur en Vloed bewusmakingsveldtog in die Suid-kaap aangebied.

Tydens 'n byeenkoms in Powertown op Dinsdag, 23 Oktober, het talle gemeenskapslede die prettige toneelstukkies met 'n pittige boodskap baie geniet, en die wisselwerking met die publiek het duidelik gewys dat begrip vir die belangrike boodskap gekweek is.

Die doel was om die effek van rampe, soos weghol brande en skielike vloede, deur 'n 30 minute industriële teaterstuk by die gemeenskap tuis te bring, en hulle te leer hoe om sodanige situasies te hanteer. Die gevare van 'speel met vuur' is ook duidelik toegelig.

Die plaaslike saaltjie was gepak met klein en groot, wat hard saam-saam geleer het aan die noodnommers 10177 en 112.
Die projek se tydsberekening is juis daarop gemik om bewusmaking te doen net voor die aanvang van die brandseisoen, sodat onnodige vure en tragedies verhoed kan word.

Die projek, wat in 2006 geloods is, se 2012 program is veral gemik op plattelandse gemeenskappe, skole en areas waar die teaterstuk nog nie vantevore aangebied is nie.

ARTIKEL: NICKEY LE ROUX, MOSSEL BAY ADVERTISER-JOERNALIS

Spacedive will help imperilled astronauts

Paris - Daredevil Felix Baumgartner's record-breaking jump raises hopes that pilots and even astronauts can be saved from accidents in the stratosphere, experts said on Monday.

Michel Viso, an expert in exobiology at France's National Centre of Scientific Research (CNRS), said Baumgartner's leap from 39 045m "has operational potential" for manned flight at extreme heights.

"In the event of a problem, people can eject at very great altitudes, provided they have a pressurised suit and self-contained breathing system and a parachute and provided they have the appropriate training," Viso told AFP.

Bernard Comet of France's Institute of Space Medicine and Physiology (MEDES) said: "It proves at the very least that one can eject at extreme altitude, although this is something that hasn't been done before."

Both Viso and Comet stressed that the technical and training challenges were major.

In contrast with Baumgartner, who leapt from a balloon, a pilot who ejected would be exposed to an extreme shock from acceleration, said Comet. As in Baumgartner's descent, there would be the challenge of preventing a spin, which could cause a blackout.

"It increases the window of opportunity for saving astronauts," Viso said.

It could in theory be used in the classic rocket-and-capsule system if a problem occurs at high altitude during the launch phase, he said.

But ejecting upon re-entry, when a spacecraft is flying at supersonic speed and battling atmospheric friction, would be impossible, Viso said.

Burn up

"If you re-enter at seven kilometres per second in a pressure suit, you will burn up, and so will your suit," he said.

In the early years of human spaceflight, the Soviet Union's Vostok system had an ejector seat, designed for launch abort on the ground and for recovery of the one-man crew at the end of the mission.

On his descent, the astronaut ejected at a height of around 6 000m.

The US Gemini system also had an ejection system in the event of a launchpad accident.

Other rocket-and-capsule systems, such as the Russian-Soviet Soyuz, the former Apollo moon missions, China's Shenzhou and Nasa's planned Orion, have an abort mechanism, comprising solid rocket boosters mounted on top of the crew capsule.

They are designed to haul the capsule to a safe parachute height while the rocket is on the ground or in early launch phase. It separates and falls to earth, to save weight, when the air thins.

Baumgartner's medical director, Jonathan Clark, lost his wife, Laurel, in the US space shuttle Columbia, which tore apart on 1 February 2003 as it re-entered the atmosphere.

The US space shuttle was fitted with a crew evacuation system after the 1986 Challenger disaster.

It could be used during return phase but not during launch phase. Even so, it could not have helped the Columbia crew.

Astronauts could bail out from a side hatch after donning parachutes, but only provided the shuttle was on a stable glide at a height of 6 150m or less.

- AFP/News24

SKA site a boost for Karoo: Zuma

Carnavon, Northern Cape - The Square Kilometre Array's (SKA) location in the Northern Cape will be a boost for the Karoo region, President Jacob Zuma said on Tuesday.

“The location of the SKA site augurs well for government's plan to build the first university in the Northern Cape province,” Zuma said in a speech prepared for delivery.

“In its pursuance for excellence in the continent and worldwide, its location in the Karoo also augurs well for tourism in the region.”

Zuma was talking during his visit to the SKA site in the Karoo town of Carnarvon.

He said government, through the department of science and technology, had identified investments in research, development, education and skills.

“The SKA project presents an opportunity to intensively recruit and train young South Africans to pursue careers in the field of science and technology.

“Since its inception in 2005, the South African SKA project's human capacity development programme has spent nearly R42 million on capacity development in radio astronomy and the disciplines of engineering relevant to radio astronomy,” said Zuma.

Government had also launched the SA Young Academy of Science last year to enhance the participation of young scientists in mainstream research and development and other key areas.

There were also plans to set up 26 science centres across the country, he said.

“The centres are vital to the development of human capital and in inculcating the culture of excellence within the field of science and technology.

“In this way we can build a promising future underpinned by a solid foundation of excellent science and technological innovation,” said Zuma.

The president said he hoped the SKA project would open more opportunities and future development not only in the Northern Cape but in the country as a whole.

- Sapa

Nasa's Curiosity Mars rover to scoop sand sample

"Rocknest": A patch of sand just downhill from a cluster of dark rocks is the site for the first scoop

The Curiosity rover is preparing to scoop its first sample of Martian soil.

The vehicle, which landed on the Red Planet in August, has driven up to a pile of sandy material that mission scientists have dubbed "Rocknest".

This weekend, the robot will dig into the ground with its clamshell-shaped trowel, with the aim first of cleaning the mechanism of earthly contamination.

Later, it will repeat the task and deliver an aspirin-sized measure of sand to onboard labs for analysis.

Nasa engineers have cautioned that the whole process will be long and drawn out. The machinery involved is complex and the team says it needs time to learn how best to operate it.

Curiosity, also known as the Mars Science Laboratory (MSL), will very likely be stationary at Rocknest for a couple of weeks while the scoop tests are carried out.

And, as with some of the earlier science experiments conducted by the rover, the scoop results - when they come - are expected to be fairly mundane. The sand is very probably just the product of weathered basalt, the ubiquitous volcanic rock on Mars' surface.

The team is more concerned about getting its sample handling procedures right than making significant new discoveries.

A key objective of the first excavations will be to thoroughly clean the internal mechanisms of the robotic arm tool that does the digging.

It is called Chimra, or Collection and Handling for Interior Martian Rock Analysis.

Although assembled in ultra-sterile conditions at Nasa, this tool will still have acquired an oily film deposit in Earth air that would contaminate the rover's lab analysis results if left in place. By running several scoops through the handling system, Curiosity can scrub the film from Chimra.

"We effectively use it to rinse our mouth three times and then spit out," explained Daniel Limonadi, the Curiosity surface sampling phase lead at the US space agency's Jet Propulsion Laboratory (JPL).

"We will take a scoop bite, we will vibrate that sand on all the different surfaces inside Chimra to effectively sand blast those surfaces, and then we dump all that material out; and we rinse and repeat three times to finish cleaning everything out."

Once this procedure is complete, a tiny sample will be delivered to the onboard labs, Sam and CheMin, to run chemical and mineralogical analyses.

The sand will be severely shaken and sieved to make sure only fine-grained material, less than the width of a human hair in diameter, reaches the instruments.

The team will be mindful of the extreme difficulty a previous Mars mission, the Phoenix probe of 2008, had in getting material to go through its sample handling system.

"Phoenix had a relatively uncontrolled drop off capability; they had just the one scoop and that scoop had to do everything," Mr Limonadi told BBC News.

"We use gravity and vibration to get things into little parts of Chimra that make very controlled volumes of portions for us to drop off."

The rover has now driven at total of 484m (of about 1,590ft) since its 6 August landing on the floor of Gale Crater, a huge depression on Mars' equator.

It still has about 176m to travel to get to a location dubbed Glenelg, a place satellite images have indicated is a junction between three different geological terrains.

It is at Glenelg where Curiosity will really get down to the business of investigating past environments in Gale.

Last week, scientists announced the robot had taken pictures of rocks that were clearly deposited in fast running water. The theory is that the rover is sitting at the head of an ancient alluvial fan where a network of streams cut across the crater floor billions of years ago.

- BBC

NASA's Global Hawk mission begins with flight to Hurricane Leslie

This image shows the flight path (red line) of a Global Hawk that departed from NASA's Dryden Flight Research Center at Edwards Air Force Base in Calif. and flew around Hurricane Leslie on Sept. 7, 2012 before landing at NASA's Wallops Flight Facility in Wallops Island, Va. Credit: NASA

NASA has begun its latest hurricane science field campaign by flying an unmanned Global Hawk aircraft over Hurricane Leslie in the Atlantic Ocean during a day-long flight from California to Virginia. With the Hurricane and Severe Storm Sentinel (HS3) mission, NASA for the first time will be flying Global Hawks from the U.S. East Coast.

The Global Hawk took off from NASA's Dryden Flight Research Center at Edwards Air Force Base, Calif., Thursday and landed at the agency's Wallops Flight Facility on Wallops Island, Va., today at 11:37 a.m. EDT after spending 10 hours collecting data on Hurricane Leslie. The month-long HS3 mission will help researchers and forecasters uncover information about how hurricanes and tropical storms form and intensify.

NASA will fly two Global Hawks from Wallops during the HS3 mission. The planes, which can stay in the air for as long as 28 hours and fly over hurricanes at altitudes greater than 60,000 feet, will be operated by pilots in ground control stations at Wallops and Dryden Flight Research Center at Edwards Air Force Base, Calif.

The mission targets the processes that underlie hurricane formation and intensity change. The aircraft help scientists decipher the relative roles of the large-scale environment and internal storm processes that shape these systems. Studying hurricanes is a challenge for a field campaign like HS3 because of the small sample of storms available for study and the great variety of scenarios under which they form and evolve. HS3 flights will continue into early October of this year and be repeated from Wallops during the 2013 and 2014 hurricane seasons.

The first Global Hawk arrived Sept. 7 at Wallops carrying a payload of three instruments that will sample the environment around hurricanes. A second Global Hawk, scheduled to arrive in two weeks, will look inside hurricanes and developing storms with a different set of instruments. The pair will measure winds, temperature, water vapor, precipitation and aerosols from the surface to the lower stratosphere.

"The primary objective of the environmental Global Hawk is to describe the interaction of tropical disturbances and cyclones with the hot, dry and dusty air that moves westward off the Saharan desert and appears to affect the ability of storms to form and intensify," said Scott Braun, HS3 mission principal investigator and research meteorologist at NASA's Goddard Space Flight Center in Greenbelt, Md.

This Global Hawk will carry a laser system called the Cloud Physics Lidar (CPL), the Scanning High-resolution Interferometer Sounder (S-HIS), and the Advanced Vertical Atmospheric Profiling System (AVAPS).

The CPL will measure cloud structure and aerosols such as dust, sea salt and smoke particles. The S-HIS can remotely sense the temperature and water vapor vertical profile along with the sea surface temperature and cloud properties. The AVAPS dropsonde system will eject small sensors tied to parachutes that drift down through the storm, measuring winds, temperature and humidity.

"Instruments on the 'over-storm' Global Hawk will examine the role of deep thunderstorm systems in hurricane intensity change, particularly to detect changes in low-level wind fields in the vicinity of these thunderstorms," said Braun.

These instruments will measure eyewall and rainband winds and precipitation using a Doppler radar and other microwave sensors called the High-altitude Imaging Wind and Rain Airborne Profiler (HIWRAP), High-Altitude MMIC Sounding Radiometer (HAMSR) and Hurricane Imaging Radiometer (HIRAD).

HIWRAP measures cloud structure and winds, providing a three-dimensional view of these conditions. HAMSR uses microwave wavelengths to measure temperature, water vapor, and precipitation from the top of the storm to the surface. HIRAD measures surface wind speeds and rain rates.

The HS3 mission is supported by several NASA centers including Wallops; Goddard; Dryden; Ames Research Center, Moffett Field, Calif.; Marshall Space Flight Center, Huntsville, Ala.; and the Jet Propulsion Laboratory, Pasadena, Calif. HS3 also has collaborations with partners from government agencies and academia.

HS3 is an Earth Venture mission funded by NASA's Science Mission Directorate in Washington. Earth Venture missions are managed by NASA's Earth System Science Pathfinder Program at the agency's Langley Research Center in Hampton, Va. The HS3 mission is managed by the Earth Science Project Office at NASA's Ames Research Center.

For more information about NASA's Airborne Science Program, visit:
http://airbornescience.nasa.gov



- NASA

Cutting-edge technology makes NASA's hurricane mission a reality

The High Altitude Monolithic Microwave integrated Circuit (MMIC) Sounding Radiometer (HAMSR) is a microwave atmospheric sounder developed by JPL under the NASA Instrument Incubator Program. Credit: NASA JPL

Cutting-edge NASA technology has made this year's NASA Hurricane mission a reality. NASA and other scientists are currently flying a suite of state-of-the-art, autonomously operated instruments that are gathering difficult-to-obtain measurements of wind speeds, precipitation, and cloud structures in and around tropical storms.

"Making these measurements possible is the platform on which the instruments are flying," said Paul Newman, the deputy principal investigator of NASA's Hurricane and Severe Storm Sentinel (HS3), managed by NASA's Goddard Space Flight Center in Greenbelt, Md. HS3 will use NASA's unmanned Global Hawks, which are capable of flying at altitudes greater than 60,000 feet with flight durations of up to 28 hours — capabilities that increase the amount of data scientists can collect. "It's a brand-new way to do science," Newman said.

The month-long HS3 mission, which began in early September, is actually a more robust follow-on to NASA's Genesis and Rapid Intensification Processes (GRIP) experiment that scientists executed in 2010. Often referred to as "GRIP on steroids," HS3 is currently deploying one instrument-laden Global Hawk from the NASA Wallops Flight Facility on Virginia's Eastern Shore to look at the environment of tropical storms. In 2013 and 2014, a second Global Hawk will be added that will focus on getting detailed measurements of the inner core of hurricanes.

Without this new aircraft, developed originally for the U.S. Air Force to gather intelligence and surveillance data, the team says the mission wouldn't be possible.

The Global Hawk's ability to fly for a much longer period of time than manned aircraft will allow it to obtain previously difficult-to-get data. Scientists hope to use that data to gain new insights into how tropical storms form, and more importantly, how they intensify into major Atlantic hurricanes — information that forecasters need to make better storm predictions, save lives, and ultimately prevent costly coastal evacuations if a storm doesn't warrant them.

"Because you can get to Africa from Wallops, we'll be able to study developing systems way out into the Atlantic," Newman explained. "Normal planes, which can fly for no more than about 10 hours, often miss the points where storms intensify," added Gerry Heymsfield, a Goddard scientist who used NASA Research and Development funding to create one of the mission's six instruments, the High-altitude Imaging Wind and Rain Airborne Profiler (HIWRAP). "With the Global Hawks, we have a much higher chance of capturing these events. Furthermore, we can sit on targets for a long time."

Just as important as the aircraft are the new or enhanced instruments designed to gather critical wind, temperature, humidity, and aerosol measurements in the environment surrounding the storm and the rain and wind patterns occurring inside their inner cores, they added. "The instruments bring it all together," Newman said. "We didn't have these instruments 10 years ago."

The Global Hawk currently on deployment at Wallops is known as the "environmental" aircraft because it samples the environment in which hurricanes are embedded. It carries three instruments.

A Goddard-provided laser system called the Cloud Physics Lidar (CPL) is located in the nose. CPL measures cloud structures and aerosols, such as dust, sea salt particles, and smoke particles, by bouncing laser light off these elements. An infrared instrument called the Scanning High-resolution Interferometer Sounder (S-HIS), provided by the University of Wisconsin in Madison, sits in the belly of the aircraft. It measures the vertical profile of temperature and water vapor.

At the tail end is a dropsonde system provided by the National Center for Atmospheric Research and the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration. This system consists of 88 paper-towel-roll-sized tubes that are ejected much like a soda can in a vending machine. As the sensor drops, a parachute slows its descent, allowing the sensor to drift down through the storm while measuring winds, temperature, pressure, and humidity.

In 2013 and 2014, working in tandem with its environmental counterpart, will be a second Global Hawk, known as the "over-storm" aircraft. It will sample the internal structure of hurricanes. It, too, will carry three instruments.

Heymsfield's HIWRAP, for example, will be situated in the belly of the Global Hawk and will be responsible for sampling the cores of hurricanes. Similar to a ground radar system, but pointed downward, HIWRAP measures rain structure and winds, providing a three-dimensional view of these conditions.

Also onboard this craft will be a microwave system called the High-Altitude MMIC Sounding Radiometer (HAMSR), created by NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory in Pasadena, Calif. Located in the aircraft's nose, this instrument uses microwave wavelengths to measure temperature, water vapor, and precipitation from the top of the storm to the surface.

At the other end of the aircraft in the tail section will be the Hurricane Imaging Radiometer (HIRAD) provided by NASA's Marshall Space Flight Center in Huntsville, Ala. This microwave instrument measures surface wind speeds and rain rates in an unusual way. It collects this data by measuring the amount of "foaminess" in ocean waters. According to Newman, the amount of foaminess is proportional to wind speeds at the surface.

Although all six instruments measure different conditions, they share one important characteristic: all operate autonomously and deliver data to scientists in real-time — another scientific advance. In the past, aircraft instruments, which often required the presence of a scientist to operate them, would record captured data. Only after the aircraft landed could scientists begin evaluating what they had collected.

With the Global Hawk, however, the data are transmitted to the ground in real-time. Should conditions warrant, the science team can direct the pilot, who flies the aircraft from a computer console on the ground, to change course or tweak the pre-programmed flight path in some way to maximize or improve the data they are gathering. "With the Global Hawk and these instruments, we can make better decisions," Heymsfield added.

The five-year mission will continue through 2014, at which time the team hopes to have dramatically improved their understanding of how storms intensify. "The insights we get will benefit forecasters," Newman said. "What we hope to do is take this technique and make it part of the operational forecast infrastructure."

The HS3 mission is supported by several NASA facilities including Wallops, Goddard, NASA's Dryden Flight Research Center at Edwards Air Force Base, Calif., Ames Research Center, Moffett Field, Calif.; Marshall Space Flight Center, Huntsville, Ala.; and the Jet Propulsion Laboratory, Pasadena, Calif. In addition, the mission also involves collaborations with various partners from government agencies and academia.

HS3 is an Earth Venture mission funded by NASA's Science Mission Directorate in Washington. Earth Venture missions are managed by NASA's Earth System Science Pathfinder Program at NASA's Langley Research Center, Hampton, Va. The HS3 Project itself is managed by the Earth Science Project Office at NASA's Ames Research Center.

For more information about the NASA GRIP mission, visit:
www.nasa.gov/grip

- NASA

Ethiopia turns to wind power to boost energy security

A view of the Adama I wind farm, located about 95 km (59 miles) southeast of Addis Ababa, Ethiopia. The farm is the only wind power scheme in the Rift Valley. ALERTNET/E.G. Woldegebriel

ADDIS ABABA, Ethiopia (AlertNet) – Ethiopia is venturing into large-scale wind power generation for the first time as it embarks on an ambitious plan to increase its electrical capacity four-fold by 2015 to meet rising domestic demand and gain export revenues.

While hydroelectric power will remain a predominant energy source, the country is looking to diversify its production of renewable power. Hydro power is vulnerable to the effects of climatic change, and non-renewable fuels such as gasoline and charcoal are polluting and expensive.

The government hopes that its plan will enable it to generate surplus power for export to neighbouring countries.

Wind power has been pursued primarily in Asia, the West and to some extent North Africa. Ethiopia’s first steps into this technology call for seven projects as part of the government’s Growth and Transformation Plan.

The first is the 120 megawatt (MW) Ashegoda Wind Farm Project, about 760 km (475 miles) north of the capital, Addis Ababa, in Tigray Regional State. It is set to be commissioned in late 2012 or early 2013 after almost four years of work.

The farm will consist of 54 wind turbines with a capacity of 1.67 MW each, and 30 with a capacity of 1 MW. Construction is being undertaken by the French company Vergnet SA at cost of nearly $300 million, with the loan guaranteed by French financial firms.

A further project is the 51 MW Adama I wind farm, located about 95 km (59 miles) southeast of the capital, and the only wind power scheme in the Rift Valley.

The $117 million Adama project is financed through a loan from the Export-Import Bank of China and being undertaken by the Chinese companies CGCOC Joint Venture and Hydro China. The wind farm was slated to be commissioned by June 2012 but is now reportedly due to be finished this month.

Hydro power currently makes up about 90 percent of Ethiopia’s total power supply. Officials at the state-owned power utility Ethiopian Electric Power Corporation (EEPCo) acknowledge that electricity generated by wind is more expensive, although the cost of hydro power varies depending on factors such as the water flow in rivers, they said.

COPING WITH LACK OF RAINFALL

Nevertheless, officials point out that wind power can complement the hydro supply and serve as a guarantor against power shortages as the demand for electricity rises.

The technologies may be particularly complementary as power production from reservoirs and dams diminishes once the rainy season is over, but winds begin to pick up at the same time, they said.

“The wind power project is cheaper and takes little space to install compared to the (gasoline fuelled) generators that the country uses in times of power shortages,” said Gossaye Mengiste, director of energy studies and development follow-up at the Ministry of Water and Energy (MoWE), which oversees the Ethiopian Electric Power Corporation.

Mengiste said that power outages are still a regular occurrence in Ethiopia’s major cities. About half the area of Ethiopia still has no access to mains electricity.

According to Stephan Willms, a project manager and coordinator for the Wind Energy Public Private Partnership Programme run by European companies Enervest, Consta and Renewco, Ethiopia must do more to use its wind power potential effectively.

According to Willms, whose programme provides training to local wind energy based industries, major challenges include persuading international companies of the market potential for wind power in Ethiopia, as well as getting them to work with local companies.

He added that it can be difficult finding competent local business that can produce the necessary high-technology products.

Fisseha Gebremichael, the Ethiopian Electric Power Corporation’s manager for wind projects, said the new schemes aim not only to generate energy from wind power but also to enhance local expertise and resources.

“Because this is the inaugural project in this sector in Ethiopia, local input is lower,” Gebremichael said.

However, he added that the power company expects technology transfer and capacity building of local staff in the Ashegoda project to enable subsequent wind projects to be built mostly with local expertise.

LEARNING FROM CHINA

Willms believes that Ethiopia could learn from the experience of China, which after building up its domestic skills mandated that at least 70 percent of wind energy products be made locally. At present he estimates that Ethiopian companies can make up to 50 percent of the value-added products needed for wind turbines.

Meanwhile, the Ethiopian government is moving ahead with further projects. Officials at the Ministry of Energy and Water said that a feasibility study for a 153 MW Adama II wind farm has been completed, with construction slated to start by the end of the year.

These projects are part of the government’s plan to generate 890 MW of wind energy by the 2014-2015 fiscal year. Other projects include a 300 MW Ayesha wind farm, projects at Debre Berhan and Assela, which are set to produce 100 MW each, and a Messebo/Harena wind farm with a capacity of 51 MW.

Ethiopia’s Growth and Transformation Plan aims to increase electricity generation from hydro-electric, geothermal, wind and sugar by-products from the current level of about 2,000 MW to 8,000 MW by the end of the plan period in 2015.

The government wants to create a “climate resilient” economy by 2025, with adequate energy for the country’s domestic needs even if hydro power runs short because of reduced rainfall.

A recent 17-month study undertaken by Chinese firm Hydrochina Corporation confirmed the high potential for wind power in the northern and southern parts of Ethiopia, particularly in the Somali region, with a huge estimated wind energy potential of 1.3 million MW.

“If Ethiopia is able to overcome (its) challenges, I believe that the economic as well as the societal cost associated with manmade and naturally inflicted power shortages in the energy supply of the country can be alleviated,” Willms said.

E.G. Woldegebriel is a journalist based in Addis Ababa with an interest in environmental issues.

- AlertNet

A clock that will last forever

Berkeley lab researchers propose a way to build the first space-time crystal.

Image Credit: Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory.

Imagine a clock that will keep perfect time forever, even after the heat-death of the universe. This is the “wow” factor behind a device known as a “space-time crystal,” a four-dimensional crystal that has periodic structure in time as well as space. However, there are also practical and important scientific reasons for constructing a space-time crystal. With such a 4D crystal, scientists would have a new and more effective means by which to study how complex physical properties and behaviors emerge from the collective interactions of large numbers of individual particles, the so-called many-body problem of physics. A space-time crystal could also be used to study phenomena in the quantum world, such as entanglement, in which an action on one particle impacts another particle even if the two particles are separated by vast distances.

A space-time crystal, however, has only existed as a concept in the minds of theoretical scientists with no serious idea as to how to actually build one – until now. An international team of scientists led by researchers with the U.S. Department of Energy (DOE)’s Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory (Berkeley Lab) has proposed the experimental design of a space-time crystal based on an electric-field ion trap and the Coulomb repulsion of particles that carry the same electrical charge.

“The electric field of the ion trap holds charged particles in place and Coulomb repulsion causes them to spontaneously form a spatial ring crystal,” says Xiang Zhang, a faculty scientist with Berkeley Lab’s Materials Sciences Division who led this research. “Under the application of a weak static magnetic field, this ring-shaped ion crystal will begin a rotation that will never stop. The persistent rotation of trapped ions produces temporal order, leading to the formation of a space-time crystal at the lowest quantum energy state.”

Because the space-time crystal is already at its lowest quantum energy state, its temporal order – or timekeeping – will theoretically persist even after the rest of our universe reaches entropy, thermodynamic equilibrium or “heat-death.”

Zhang, who holds the Ernest S. Kuh Endowed Chair Professor of Mechanical Engineering at the University of California (UC) Berkeley, where he also directs the Nano-scale Science and Engineering Center, is the corresponding author of a paper describing this work in Physical Review Letters (PRL). The paper is titled “Space-time crystals of trapped ions.” Co-authoring this paper were Tongcang Li, Zhe-Xuan Gong, Zhang-Qi Yin, Haitao Quan, Xiaobo Yin, Peng Zhang and Luming Duan.

The concept of a crystal that has discrete order in time was proposed earlier this year by Frank Wilczek, the Nobel-prize winning physicist at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology. While Wilczek mathematically proved that a time crystal can exist, how to physically realize such a time crystal was unclear. Zhang and his group, who have been working on issues with temporal order in a different system since September 2011, have come up with an experimental design to build a crystal that is discrete both in space and time – a space-time crystal. Papers on both of these proposals appear in the same issue of PRL (September 24, 2012).

Traditional crystals are 3D solid structures made up of atoms or molecules bonded together in an orderly and repeating pattern. Common examples are ice, salt and snowflakes. Crystallization takes place when heat is removed from a molecular system until it reaches its lower energy state. At a certain point of lower energy, continuous spatial symmetry breaks down and the crystal assumes discrete symmetry, meaning that instead of the structure being the same in all directions, it is the same in only a few directions.

“Great progress has been made over the last few decades in exploring the exciting physics of low-dimensional crystalline materials such as two-dimensional graphene, one-dimensional nanotubes, and zero-dimensional buckyballs,” says Tongcang Li, lead author of the PRL paper and a post-doc in Zhang’s research group. “The idea of creating a crystal with dimensions higher than that of conventional 3D crystals is an important conceptual breakthrough in physics and it is very exciting for us to be the first to devise a way to realize a space-time crystal.”

This proposed space-time crystal shows (a) periodic structures in both space and time with (b) ultracold ions rotating in one direction even at the lowest energy state. Image Credit: Xiang Zhang group.

Just as a 3D crystal is configured at the lowest quantum energy state when continuous spatial symmetry is broken into discrete symmetry, so too is symmetry breaking expected to configure the temporal component of the space-time crystal. Under the scheme devised by Zhang and Li and their colleagues, a spatial ring of trapped ions in persistent rotation will periodically reproduce itself in time, forming a temporal analog of an ordinary spatial crystal. With a periodic structure in both space and time, the result is a space-time crystal.

“While a space-time crystal looks like a perpetual motion machine and may seem implausible at first glance,” Li says, “keep in mind that a superconductor or even a normal metal ring can support persistent electron currents in its quantum ground state under the right conditions. Of course, electrons in a metal lack spatial order and therefore can’t be used to make a space-time crystal.”

Li is quick to point out that their proposed space-time crystal is not a perpetual motion machine because being at the lowest quantum energy state, there is no energy output. However, there are a great many scientific studies for which a space-time crystal would be invaluable.

“The space-time crystal would be a many-body system in and of itself,” Li says. “As such, it could provide us with a new way to explore classic many-body questions physics question. For example, how does a space-time crystal emerge? How does time translation symmetry break? What are the quasi-particles in space-time crystals? What are the effects of defects on space-time crystals? Studying such questions will significantly advance our understanding of nature.”

Peng Zhang, another co-author and member of Zhang’s research group, notes that a space-time crystal might also be used to store and transfer quantum information across different rotational states in both space and time. Space-time crystals may also find analogues in other physical systems beyond trapped ions.

“These analogs could open doors to fundamentally new technologies and devices for variety of applications,” he says.

Xiang Zhang believes that it might even be possible now to make a space-time crystal using their scheme and state of the art ion traps. He and his group are actively seeking collaborators with the proper ion-trapping facilities and expertise.

“The main challenge will be to cool an ion ring to its ground state,” Xiang Zhang says. “This can be overcome in the near future with the development of ion trap technologies. As there has never been a space-time crystal before, most of its properties will be unknown and we will have to study them. Such studies should deepen our understandings of phase transitions and symmetry breaking.”

Via Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory

Why Curiosity Matters

Sept. 21, 2012: Adam Steltzner doesn’t sound much like an ordinary engineer.

For instance, when we asked him if he would talk about Curiosity—and explain why the Mars rover matters to ordinary people--the former rock-n-roller responded "I'm totally down with that."

He really is down with it. Steltzner is the NASA engineer who helped take the country's cool new Curiosity rover to the surface of Mars with moves – and flair – even Evel Knievel would envy.

Steltzner begins, "I'm so thankful to Clara Ma for suggesting the name 'Curiosity.' It embodies a fundamental attribute that defines us as humans. "

“Why do we explore? It’s our nature,” he says. “Human curiosity is why you and I can talk across the country by phone. It's why I'm sitting 60 feet above the ground in a building made of alloys and other high-tech composite materials. We dominate this planet because we wonder what's around the next corner."

When people ask Steltzner "Is the new rover worth 2 ½ billion dollars?" he has a compelling answer:

"It's not 2 ½ billion dollars we stuffed in a trunk and blew into space. It’s thousands of high tech jobs spread over 37 states. It's honing and developing our skills in science, engineering, and math."

He notes that the U.S. has slipped to 14th in science education and 18th in math1 – in a world where we're competing for economic prosperity with nations 1 through 13.

"This mission is an investment in high tech jobs, in inspiring the youth of our country, in stepping up rung by rung toward 1st place. It's the best stimulus you could imagine!"

Okay, curiosity matters--but does it matter more than rock-n-roll? Steltzner played guitar in a rock band for years, so he has the chops to answer this question, too.

"In some sense, exploration and music are both art forms," he says. "They're both expressions of our humanity. But exploration can surprise us more - or at least differently - than music can. Music can surprise us only about what we find in ourselves. Exploration surprises us with what we learn of ourselves and of the universe."

Steltzner says music led him to exploration. During high school he played in a rock band. One night driving home from a gig he noticed that the constellation Orion was in a different place than it had been before.

But why? "I hadn't paid attention during high school classes at all. So I didn't know."

His curiosity made him decide to take an astronomy class. First, though, astronomy had prerequisites such as elementary algebra and conceptual physics. He took them all. "I basically redid my high school education at the community college."

The rest--which includes a bachelor’s degree from UC Davis, a master’s degree from Caltech, a job at JPL, and a daredevil landing on Mars--is history.

After the glory of the Curiosity landing fades, what will this explorer do next?

"Our solar system offers us grand challenges," says Steltzner. "I'd like to see a Mars sample return. I'd like to land on the surface of Europa – the most likely place in the solar system for life. And third, I'd like to float a boat on the methane lakes of Titan."

"The solar system is calling out to us," he says. "The wind's at our back. It's time to explore!"


Author: Dauna D. Coulter| Editor: Dr. Tony Phillips | Credit: Science@NASA

NOAA Contributions to SPURS

A NOAA buoy in the water.

When we are doing work at sea, it hardly seems fair for NASA to hog the limelight. We are usually offering data from satellites, not ships, moorings, or gliders. There are partner agencies in the U.S. Government who make enormous contributions to the physical oceanography enterprise. In D.C., oceanographers know these agencies as “the four N’s” – NASA, the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA), the National Science Foundation (NSF), and the Navy. Because each, in its own way, contributes to the success of physical oceanography in the USA and of SPURS in particular, I am going to try to tell you about them through their contributions and through relevant posts from the field. With this post, I am going to focus on NOAA.

The 5-cent summary is that NOAA Pacific Marine Environmental Laboratory (PMEL) is proving two moorings for SPURS and the NOAA Atlantic Oceanographic and Meteorological Laboratory (AOML)  is providing enhancement to their ongoing basin-wide observing system.

One way we divided up SPURS scientifically was to look at all the relevant time and space scales of salinity variation (minutes to years and inches to thousands of miles), and then see at who was strong in particular areas observationally. NOAA is the key agency when it comes to monitoring the global ocean with measurements in the water. They maintain moorings in the tropical oceans for seasonal climate prediction, Argo floats around the globe for monitoring of upper ocean temperature and salinity profiles, a global array of surface drifters for sea surface temperature and surface velocity maps….and the list goes on.

So when it came time to consider how SPURS would fit within North Atlantic Ocean monitoring, we turned to NOAA for assistance. When we deploy Argo floats and surface drifters in SPURS, these measurements enhance our knowledge of salinity in our study area, but the instruments will also remain in place for years to come and contribute to the Atlantic Ocean monitoring array maintained by NOAA. Likewise, NOAA is happy to help SPURS wherever, so that they enhance their knowledge of processes in this part of the Atlantic, where normally they have a sparse array of measurements.

AOML started a new XBT transect between Cape Town and New York City (referred as AX08) on August 18, with XBTs deployed every 15.5 miles (25 kilometers). This is the third of five AX08 realizations that will be done on 2012. There are five realizations planned for 2013. A total of 550 XBTs are deployed on each realization.

Enhancement XBT line for SPURS.

A planned NOAA expedition to in September with some SPURS-related activity had to be postponed due to mechanical malfunction of the ship, the R/V Ron Brown.

It’s very exciting for us to help PMEL by deploying two of their “Prawler” moorings in SPURS. The Prawler is an instrument that crawls up the mooring wire and then profiles temperature and salinity as it falls down the wire. It gains energy from the mooring motion and can do a complete profile nearly every hour. A full and fascinating description is available here.

A Prawler on a wire.

To summarize, in order for NASA to advance the science of physical oceanography, we work closely with other federal agencies, such as NOAA, to bring the correct mix of measurements and technology to the field. SPURS is most definitely a team effort!

- NASA Earth Observatory

Wide Awake in the Sea of Tranquillity

Above: Apollo 11 Earthrise

Neil Armstrong was supposed to be asleep. The moonwalking was done. The moon rocks were stowed away. His ship was ready for departure. In just a few hours, the Eagle's ascent module would blast off the Moon, something no ship had ever done before, and Neil needed his wits about him. He curled up on the Eagle's engine cover and closed his eyes.

But he could not sleep.

Neither could Buzz Aldrin. In the cramped lander, Buzz had the sweet spot, the floor. He stretched out as much as he could in his spacesuit and closed his eyes. Nothing happened. On a day like this, sleep was out of the question.

July 20, 1969: The day began on the farside of the Moon. Armstrong, Aldrin and crewmate Mike Collins flew their spaceship 60 miles above the cratered wasteland. No one on Earth can see the Moon's farside. Even today it remains a land of considerable mystery, but the astronauts had no time for sight-seeing. Collins pressed a button, activating a set of springs, and the spaceship split in two. The half named Columbia, with Collins on board, would remain in orbit. The other half, the Eagle, spiraled over the horizon toward the Sea of Tranquillity.

"You are Go for powered descent," Houston radioed, and the Eagle's engine fired mightily. The bug-shaped Eagle was so fragile a child could poke a hole through its gold foil exterior. Jagged moonrocks could do much worse. So when Armstrong saw where the computer was guiding them--into a boulder field-足he quickly took control. The Eagle pitched forward and sailed over the rocks.

Meanwhile, alarms were ringing in the background.

"Program alarm," announced Armstrong. "It's a 1202." The code was so obscure, almost no one knew what it meant. Should they abort? Should they land? "What is it?" he insisted.

Scrambling back in Houston, a young engineer named Steve Bales produced the answer: The radar guidance system was pestering the computer with too many interruptions. No problem. "We've got you..." radioed Houston. "We're Go on that alarm."

And on they went. Things, however, were not going exactly as planned. The Sea of Tranquillity was supposed to be smooth, but it didn't look so smooth from the cockpit of the Eagle. Armstrong scanned the jumbled mare for a safe place to land. "60 seconds," radioed Houston. "30 seconds." Mission control was hushed as the telemetry came in. Soon, too soon, the ship would run out of fuel.

Capcom later claimed the "boys in mission control were turning blue" when Armstrong announced "I [found] a good spot." As for Armstrong, his heart was thumping 156 beats per minute according to bio-sensors. The fuel gauge read only 5.6% when the Eagle finally settled onto the floor of the Sea of Tranquillity.

Houston (relieved): "We copy you down, Eagle."

Armstrong (coolly): "Houston, Tranquility Base here. The Eagle has landed."

Immediately, they prepared to leave. This was NASA being cautious. No one had ever landed on the Moon before. What if a footpad started sinking into the moondust, or the Eagle sprung a leak? While Neil and Buzz made ready to blast off, Houston read the telemetry looking for signs of trouble. There were none, and three hours after touchdown, finally, Houston gave the "okay." The moonwalk was on!

At 9:56 p.m. EDT, Neil descended the ladder and took "one small step" (left foot first) into history. From the shadow of the Eagle, he looked around: "It has a stark beauty all its own--like the high desert of the United States." Houston reminded him to gather the "contingency sample," and Neil put some rocks and soil in his pocket. If, for any reason, the astronauts had to take off in a hurry, scientists back on Earth would get at least a pocketful of the Moon for their experiments.

Soon, Buzz joined him. "Beautiful view!" he exclaimed when he reached the lander's broad footpad. "Isn't that something!" agreed Armstrong. "Magnificent sight out here."

"Magnificent desolation," said Aldrin.

Those two words summed up the yin-yang of the Moon. The impact craters, the toppled boulders, the layers of moondust--it was utterly alien. Yet Tranquillity Base felt curiously familiar, like home. Later Apollo astronauts had similar feelings. Maybe this comes from staring at the Moon so often from Earth. Or maybe it's because the Moon is a piece of Earth, spun off our young planet billions of years ago. No one knows; it just is.

Above: Buzz Aldrin and the Eagle.

Truly, much of the scene was weird. The airless landscape jumped out at the astronauts with disconcerting clarity and, as a result, the horizon felt unnaturally close. Worse yet, the whole world seemed to curve, a side-effect of the Moon's short thousand-mile radius. "Distances [here] are deceiving," noted Aldrin.

The sky was equally baffling. Although the Eagle had landed on a bright lunar morning, the sky was as black as midnight. An astronomer's paradise? No. Not a single star was visible. The glaring, sunlit ground ruined the astronaut's night vision. Only Earth itself was bright enough to be seen, luminous blue and white, hanging overhead.

Armstrong was particularly fascinated by moondust, which he kicked and scuffed with his boots. On Earth, kicking dust makes a little cloud in the air--but there is no air on the Moon. "When you kick the surface, [the dust goes out in] a little fan which, to me, is in the shape of a rose petal," recalls Armstrong. "There's just a little ring of particles--nothing behind 'em--no dust, no swirl, no nothing. It's really unique."

Enough of that. It was time for work.

Almost forgotten in Apollo lore are the checklists sewn to the forearms of the spacesuits. These "honey-do" memos from NASA were jam-packed with activities--from inspecting the lander to deploying the TV to collecting samples. Some of the tasks were as detailed as bending over and reporting to Mission Control how it went. They had a lot to do.

Neil and Buzz deployed a solar wind collector, a seismometer and a laser retroreflector. They erected a flag and uncovered a plaque proclaiming, "We came in peace for all mankind." They took the first interplanetary phone call--"I just can't tell you how proud we all are," said President Nixon from the Oval Office. They collected 47 lbs of moon rocks and took 166 pictures. Check. Check. Check.

Finally, after two and a half busy, exhilarating hours, it was time to go. The checklist continued: Climb back in the Eagle. Stow the rocks. Prepare the ship for departure (again). Eat dinner: Beef stew or cream of chicken soup. And finally, sleep.

That was the limit. "You just are not going to get any sleep while you're waiting [for liftoff]," Aldrin said after the mission.

The Eagle was not a sleepy place. The tiny cabin was noisy with pumps and bright with warning lights that couldn't be dimmed. Even the window shades were glowing, illuminated by intense sunshine outside. "After I got into my sleep stage and all settled down, I realized there was something else [bothering me]," said Armstrong. The Eagle had an optical telescope sticking out periscope-style. "Earth was shining right through the telescope into my eye. It was like a light bulb."

To get some relief, they closed the helmets of their spacesuits. It was quiet inside and they "wouldn't be breathing all the dust" they had tramped in after the moon walk, said Aldrin. Alas, it didn't work. The suit's cooling systems, so necessary out on the scorching lunar surface, were too cold for sleeping inside the Eagle. The best Aldrin managed was a "couple hours of mentally fitful drowsing." Armstrong simply stayed awake.

When the wake-up call finally came,

"Tranquility Base, Tranquility Base, Houston. Over."

Armstrong answered with alacrity,

"Good morning, Houston. Tranquility Base. Over."

The long day was done. It was time to go home, to Earth, for a good night's sleep.

Author: Dr. Tony Phillips | Production Editor: Dr. Tony Phillips | Credit: Science@NASA

More Information
This is the fourth installment of Science@NASA's Apollo Chronicles:

Episode 1: Dark Shadows
Episode 2: Jack Skis the Moon
Episode 3: The Smell of Moondust
The author would like to thank Eric Joneswho penned the Apollo Lunar Surface Journal, a must-read for historians of the Apollo program. Many of the radio transmissions and recollections reported in this story come from the Journal.
How crowded was the Eagle? Click here to see.
The Vision for Space Exploration

Neil Armstrong, first man on the moon, dies at 82

Neil Armstrong, the first man to walk on the moon, has died aged 82. His family described him as a 'reluctant American hero'. Photograph: AP

Neil Armstrong, the first man to walk on the moon, has died aged 82. The former US astronaut, who will go down on history as the most famous pioneer of space exploration, passed away as the result of heart complications following surgery.

As commander of the Apollo 11 mission, he became the first person to set foot on the moon, on 20 July 1969, fulfilling the longheld dream of the United States to get there before the Soviet Union. His first words as he stepped on to the surface – "That's one small step for man, one giant leap for mankind" – instantly became one of the most recognisable phrases ever uttered.

Armstrong underwent heart bypass surgery earlier this month, just two days after his birthday on 5 August, to relieve blocked arteries.

His family released a statement on Saturday describing him as a "reluctant American hero who always believed he was just doing his job".

It read: "We are heartbroken to share the news that Neil Armstrong has passed away following complications resulting from cardiovascular procedures. Neil was our loving husband, father, grandfather, brother and friend. Neil Armstrong was also a reluctant American hero who always believed he was just doing his job. He served his nation proudly as a Navy fighter pilot, test pilot, and astronaut.

"While we mourn the loss of a very good man we also celebrate his remarkable life and hope that it serves as an example to young people around the world to work hard to make their dreams come true, to be willing to explore and push the limits, and to selflessly serve a cause greater than themselves."

Other tributes have come flooding in for the astronaut as news of his death spread across the world. US president Barack Obama hailed Armstrong as one of America's greatest heroes. In a statement issued by the White House, he said the crew of Apollo 11 carried with them the aspirations of an entire nation when they set out for the moon in 1969. He later tweeted: "Neil Armstrong was a hero not just of his time, but of all time. Thank you, Neil, for showing us the power of one small step."

Former astronaut Tom Jones, who completed four space shuttle flights between 1990 and 2001, said: "Mr Armstrong was one of the astronauts that was my hero when I was growing up and I watched his initial landing on the moon in 1969 with incredible interest. He really was an inspiration to an entire generation of people." The US space agency tweeted: "Nasa offers its condolences on today's passing of Neil Armstrong, former test pilot, astronaut & the 1st man on the moon. Neil was 82."

Armstrong grew up in Ohio with a keen interest in flight and earned his pilot's certificate when he was just 15. After flying combat missions during the Korean war, he became a test pilot and joined Nasa's astronaut programme in 1962.

Armstrong was joined on his moon landing by Buzz Aldrin and the pair spent nearly three hours walking on the lunar surface, collecting samples, conducting experiments and taking photographs. Last night Aldrin called Armstrong "a true American hero and the best pilot I ever knew". The Apollo 11 mission turned out to be Armstrong's last space flight. The following year he was appointed to a desk job at Nasa, later becoming a lecturer in engineering at Cincinnati University.

In 1961 President Kennedy had declared before the United States Congress that the US would have a man on the moon before the turn of the decade and the moon walk marked America's victory in the cold war space race. An estimated 600 million people – a fifth of the world's population – watched and listened to the moon landing, the largest audience for any single event in history.

- The Guardian

NASA Rocket Mission Carrying University Student Experiments

WALLOPS ISLAND, Va. -- University students will put their academic skills to the test when atmospheric and technology experiments they developed fly on a NASA suborbital sounding rocket. The launch will take place between 6:30 and 10 a.m., Thursday, Aug. 23, from the agency's Wallops Flight Facility at Wallops Island, Va.

Four university experiments will be flown as part of an educational project called RockSat-X, which is designed to provide students hands-on experience in designing, fabricating, testing and conducting experiments for space flight. The project is a joint effort between NASA and the Colorado Space Grant Consortium at the University of Colorado at Boulder.

The selected experiments for this year's RockSat launch are from Baylor University in Waco, Texas; University of Colorado at Boulder; the University of Puerto Rico; and Virginia Polytechnic Institute and State University (Virginia Tech) in Blacksburg, Va.

"RockSat-X is part of a series of student flight programs designed to enhance students' skills and prepare them for careers at NASA and in the aerospace industry," said Chris Koehler, director of the Colorado Space Grant Consortium.

The program begins with a hands-on workshop called RockOn and then proceeds to the RockSat-C and RockSat-X programs. At each level, the experiments become more complex, which provides students an opportunity to gain a greater understanding of the requirements for developing space-based experiments.

The experiments will fly on a two-stage Terrier-Improved Malemute rocket to a projected altitude of 98 miles. After the 15-minute flight, the payload carrying the experiments will splash down via parachute in the Atlantic Ocean approximately 66 miles off the coast of Virginia. The 875-pound payload will be recovered for re-use and experiment analysis.

The University of Puerto Rico will use a mass spectrometer to conduct an analysis of atmospheric particles and pressure. Virginia Tech and Baylor universities have teamed up to measure nitric oxide and atmospheric dust. The University of Colorado will be testing a device to assist in de-orbiting small spacecraft and the Colorado Space Grant Consortium will fly seven cameras to capture all the action in high-definition, which will be made available to the public shortly after recovery.

The RockSat-X concept provides students with a payload structure with pre-defined mechanical, power and data interfaces and volume and mass limits. This is the second RockSat-X mission, with the first having been flown July 11, 2011.

The project will be the ninth suborbital rocket mission this year from NASA's launch facility on Wallops Island and the first of four launches scheduled through mid-September.

RockSat-X program information is available at:

http://spacegrant.colorado.edu/rockon/

The launch will be available live on Ustream at:

http://www.ustream.com/channel/nasa-wallops

For more about NASA's Wallops Flight Facility, visit:

http://www.nasa.gov/wallops

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