SPACE
& SCIENCE NEWS: September 2000
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& science news > space & science news: September 2000
Mars 2001 to continue the odyssey
(Sep. 29, 2000)
NASA's next Mars orbiter scheduled for launch toward the Red Planet
on April 7, 2001, has been officially named Mars
2001 Odyssey, to commemorate the famous Clarke/Kubrick film. The
probe will study the kinds of minerals on the surface and measure
the amount of hydrogen in the shallow subsurfaces of the planet, which
will give clues about the presence of water, either past or present.
Additionally, the craft will obtain important data on the planet's
radiation environment so that potential health risks to future human
explorers can be evaluated. Mars 2001 Odyssey will enter Mars orbit
in October 2001.
For more, go here. |
A hint of intelligence at the cellular
level
(Sep. 27, 2000)
Japanese researchers have shown that pieces of slime
mold, attracted by food, can find the shortest way through a maze.
Toshayuki Nakagi and his colleagues at the Bio-mimetic Control Research
Center in Nagoya, Japan, say they believe the organism altered its
shape to maximize its forging efficiency. "This remarkable process
of cellular computation," the team writes in this week's Nature,
"implies that cellular materials can show a primitive intelligence."
For more, go here. |
Organic pigments found on Mars?
(Sep. 27, 2000)
A Russian researcher claims to have found evidence of organic pigments
in the western Utopia
Planitia region of Mars.
Using images obtained by the Hubble Space Telescope, Sergei Pershin,
a Principal Investigator for the LIDAR experiment aboard NASA's failed
Mars Polar Lander, believes
he may have detected the spectral signatures of porphyrin and hopanoid
molecules which are characteristic of cyanobacteria.
N.b. These results are extremely tentative and should be regarded
with a good degree of skepticism. |
First peer-reviewed journal devoted
to astrobiology
(Sep. 22, 2000)
Until now, papers and articles on astrobiology have had to be published
in journals on more general subjects. But from 2001, a new journal,
Astrobiology, will be available that specializes exclusively
in this rapidly rising new field. Said publisher Mary Ann Liebert:
"Astrobiology, in it its broadest sense, is developing as an area
of distinct academic endeavor. This journal will provide a home for
multidisciplinary studies and play an important role in the growth
of the field." Astrobiology will be published both in paper
an online. Its editor-in-chief will be Sherry Cady, assistant professor
in the Department of Geology at Portland State University, Oregon. |
Superoxides could prevent Martian surface
life
(Sep. 17, 2000)
Laboratory simulations at JPL of the Martian surface environment have
shown that the combination of harsh ultraviolet radiation, free oxygen
ions in the atmosphere, mineral grains, and extremely dry conditions
produces superoxide ions. These would explain the activity found in
the Martian soil by the Viking
landers in 1976, and almost certainly make life impossible at or very
near the surface. A major goal of future research will be to establish
the depth of the oxidizing layer.
For more, go here
(Spaceflight Now) and here
(New Scientist). |
Centaur's strange ice found by Hubble
(Sep. 14, 2000)
The earliest seafloor hydrothermal
vents – supposedly more than three billion years old –
may be nothing more than deposits from underground springs active
in the last few thousand years. That is the claim of two US geologists
who carried out a new analysis of rocks from South Africa which were
previously dated to the Archaean period – when life first began
to diversify. The findings could have important implications for our
understanding of the early Earth and the microbial life forms that
lived there. But one authority on the geology of the Barberton greenstone
belt - where the rocks are found – launched a vigorous defense
of evidence that they contain ancient hydrothermal vents.
Read
more. Source: BBC |
Mars Wars: Is one Beagle better than two
Athenas?
(Sep. 13, 2000)
The chief scientist on the Beagle
2 project – Britain's miniature Mars lander that will piggyback
aboard the European Mars Express probe in 2004 – believes it
will do more science that NASA's two large rovers scheduled for launch
in 2003. Whereas the rovers, each equipped with Cornell's Athena
package will do only geological and sightseeing work, Beagle 2 will
actually look for biogenic signatures including trace methane in the
atmosphere and an elevated carbon-12 to carbon-13 ratio in the surface
rocks.
For more, go here. |
Meteorite clues to dawn of solar system
(Sep. 5, 2000)
Researchers at Purdue University have analyzed 45 elements within
the Tagish Lake meteorite (for earlier story on this, go here)
and found that it represents a pristine sample of the original solar
nebula from which the planets formed. This, together with the rapid
collection of uncontaminated fragments of the carbonaceous
chondrite following its fall in January, make the Tagish Lake
meteorite one of the most valuable to science ever found.
For more, go here. |
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