Potpourri CVIII

Note to other Blogger.com users: For some reason the "Paste" option is disabled in IE 8. Copy/paste works just fine in Firefox!

Busy research day…too much stuff to explain everything in detail, so I'm just posting headlines and links.

Monarch Butterflies in Spaaaaaaaace!
http://www.space.com/scienceastronomy/091208-space-monarch-butterflies.html

Leonard David on Public Space Travel
http://www.space.com/businesstechnology/091207-spaceshiptwo-space-touristm.html

Variations in Brightness for Sun-like Stars
http://www.space.com/scienceastronomy/091207-sun-stars-brightness.html

Cassini Providing Data on the Heliosphere
http://www.spacedaily.com/reports/View_From_The_Center_Of_The_Solar_System_999.html

Jeffrey Bell on “Rocket Plane Roulette”
http://www.spacedaily.com/reports/Rocket_Plane_Roulette_999.html

NASA Moon Design Competition
http://www.space-travel.com/reports/NASA_announces_moon_design_competition_999.html

Climate Protestors Climb the Roman Colosseum
http://www.spacedaily.com/2006/091209124623.rpqa087c.html

NASA Managers Looking at Adding Another Shuttle Flight
http://www.nasaspaceflight.com/2009/12/nasa-evaluating-sts-135-addition-to-shuttle-manifest/

Moment of Random: Captain Berlin vs. Hitler
http://www.needcoffee.com/2009/12/08/captain-berlin-vs-hitler-movie-review/#more-14335

Need Coffee eview of Neil Gaiman’s American Gods
http://www.needcoffee.com/2009/12/08/neil-gaiman-dreams/#more-14323

RFI for Using Constellation or Robotic Hardware for Future Missions
http://www.spaceref.com/news/viewsr.html?pid=32990

Anti-Terrorism Hero or Wishful-Thinking Nut?
http://tpmmuckraker.talkingpointsmemo.com/2009/12/tedd_petruna_i_thwarted_muslim_hijackers_on_airtra.php?ref=mp

Creating Starfleet Academy?

NASAWatch: http://nasawatch.com/archives/2009/11/creating-starfl.html
OpenNASA: http://www.opennasa.com/2009/12/07/starfleet-academy/
Me: http://bartacus.blogspot.com/2008/07/starfleet-academy-proposal-several.html

Bar Camp? Not Quite What You’re Thinking…
http://www.opennasa.com/2009/12/05/spaceup-a-space-unconference/
http://spaceup.org/agenda/
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/BarCamp

Government in the Digital Age
http://www.opennasa.com/2009/11/25/government-in-the-digital-age/

Leading in an Era of Disruptive Innovation (THINK, for God’s sake and your own. THINK before you unleash your infernal gadgets on the world!!!)
http://www.opennasa.com/2009/11/19/leading-amidst-the-disruptive-innovation-storm/

Boeing Looking for a Non-Union Source of 787 Parts Due to Strike (I’m shocked, shocked…)
http://www.bizjournals.com/seattle/stories/2009/12/07/daily19.html

Flight Delays Up in October (Okay, fine, but how many of those were due to airline problems vs. the government’s antiquated Air Traffic Control system?)
=http://www.usatoday.com/money/industries/travel/2009-12-08-october-airline-performance_N.htm

Go Boldly on The Space Show
http://www.goboldlynasa.org/
http://spacefellowship.com/2009/12/07/this-week-on-the-space-show-121/
http://www.thespaceshow.com/detail.asp?q=1271

(From Dar the Science Cheerleader) Hydrogen-Powered Cars for Kids...and This is a Toy!
http://www.sciencecheerleader.com/2009/12/the-cure-for-the-holiday-shopping-blues/

Science Jewelry for the Brain
http://www.sciencecheerleader.com/2009/12/science-jewelry-for-your-brain/

I Can Has Singularity?
http://ieet.org/index.php/IEET/more/cascio20091120/

Global Warming and Mt. Kilimanjaro
http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424052748704342404574577892593153408.html?mod=rss_Today%27s_Most_Popular

Did You Know that CO2 Was a Threat to Public Health? According to the EPA, It Is
http://www.jerrypournelle.com/view/2009/Q4/view600.html#Tuesday

Shubber Ali on Giving Up Space Blogging (Can’t Say That I Blame Him)
http://spacecynic.wordpress.com/2009/11/27/thanksgiving-and-a-sort-of-farewell/

Jeff Foust on NASA’s FY2010 Budget
http://www.spacepolitics.com/2009/12/09/fy2010-budget-endgame/

Chris Carberry Resigns from Mars Society Executive Director Post
http://www.spacepolitics.com/2009/12/05/mars-society-executive-director-steps-down/

Soyuz to Start Launching from French Guiana
http://www.flightglobal.com/articles/2009/11/30/335601/soyuz-to-go-west-in-2010.html

For Orlando people who get warm and romantic thoughts about cold & ice
http://www.orlandosentinel.com/travel/attractions/orl-ice-pg,0,1748946.photogallery

Walt Disney World is Reducing Discounts in 2010. Wait a minute, Disney does discounts??
http://thedailydisney.com/blog/2009/12/iger-disney-will-dial-back-on-park-discounts-in-latter-part-of-2010/

The Copenhagen summit on global climate change is not going well...the U.N. is not happy that it's not getting its way and that a draft agreement was leaked to the press
http://www.guardian.co.uk/environment/2009/dec/08/copenhagen-climate-summit-disarray-danish-text

From my NASA PAO feed:

NASA MAKING GOVERNMENT MORE ACCESSIBLE WITH CUTTING-EDGE USE OF NEW MEDIA

WASHINGTON -- NASA is supporting the White House's Open Government
Directive with a number of Internet-based programs designed to make
the agency more accessible and create a dialog with the American
people about their space program.

NASA is one of six departments and agencies working to spur innovation
by making it easier for high-tech companies to identify
collaborative, entrepreneurial opportunities. Government agencies are
home to treasure troves of data and information, too much of which is
underutilized by the private sector because it is either not easily
found or exists in cumbersome formats. NASA and the National
Institutes of Health, the Food and Drug Administration in the
Department of Health and Human Services, the Agricultural Research
Service in the Department of Agriculture, the National Institute of
Standards and Technology in the Department of Commerce and the
Department of Energy are working together to increase access to
information on publicly-funded technologies that are available for
license, opportunities for federal funding and partnerships, and
potential private-sector partners.

NASA's Innovative Partnerships Programs Office is working to establish
an RSS feed to publicize technologies available for public licensing.
By making information from multiple agencies available in RSS and XML
feeds on Data.gov, the government empowers innovators to find the
information they need and receive real-time updates, which can fuel
entrepreneurial momentum, create new jobs, and strengthen economic
growth. NASA's RSS feed will make these opportunities more visible to
the commercial and research communities. NASA plans on having the
feed operational by Dec. 31.

NASA also has undertaken an extensive effort to use the Internet and
social media tools to engage the public on agency activities. NASA's
home page on the Internet, www.nasa.gov, offers information on all of
the agency's missions, research and discoveries.

In January 2009, nasa.gov capitalized on the agency's growing social
media efforts by rolling out a new "Connect and Collaborate with
NASA" page, at www.nasa.gov/connect. This provides the public with
quick connections to the agency's pages on Twitter, Facebook,
UStream, YouTube, Flickr and MySpace, as well as NASA podcasts and
vodcasts on iTunes. The page also provides links to agency chats,
Tweetup events, RSS feeds and the agency's official blog.

The agency's social media presence was further expanded in November
with the addition of NASA's Twitter feed to the homepage. The website
offers links to NASA-related desktop "widgets" and opportunities for
the public to collaborate directly with the agency through art
contests, engineering challenges and imagery and data analysis.

Another new communication tool is Spacebook, a NASA internal expert
networking utility. Spacebook has been used to improve collaboration
across NASA's Goddard Space Flight Center. The Spacebook site allows
new and established NASA staff to get to know the agency's diverse
community of scientists, engineers, project managers and support
personnel.

"Space doesn't explore itself. Science doesn't discover itself. People
do that, and to do that they have to talk," said Emma Antunes, the
project manager who also manages Goddard's Web site. "They have to
trade questions and ideas. They have to connect. And, the more
diverse the group, the more likely connections and conversations will
lead to new ideas and innovation. Spacebook will enhance NASA's
capacity to do just that."

A fun video from the Coalition for Space Exploration: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=K-ZWMeFR5bw

TV show recommendation by Hu: Outer Space Astronauts... http://www.syfy.com/outerspaceastronauts/

Web Contest:
Enter this contest for pre-collegiate students by building a Web site that communicates your vision of the future.

Furniture made from reclaimed wine barrels: http://www.etsy.com/shop/StilNovoDesign

And, of course, I'd be remiss as a space geek if I didn't point out the rollout of SpaceShipTwo on Virgin Galactic's site.

And I think that'll do for tonight...

The Swirl

First, I invite you to read Jeff Foust's latest piece on the Augustine Human Space Flight panel. Go ahead, I'll wait...

Now I'll throw my own shrimp on the barbie--gingerly, of course. I've got a stake in this business in the form of a day job. There's been enough attention paid to this matter that one can't help admire the tempest in a teapot. The contenders for leading America's next generation of space exploration include:

• The Constellation Program as currently built: the Ares I crew launch vehicle for sending human beings in the Orion crew exploration vehicle into orbit, and the Ares V cargo launch vehicle, which can place the Altair lunar lander into orbit, along with an Earth departure stage (EDS). Missions to the International Space Station would require only Ares I and Orion. In a lunar exploration scenario, Ares V would launch Altair and the EDS into orbit. Next, Ares I launches Orion into orbit; Orion docks with Altair, and then the EDS fires its engine to send Orion and Altair toward the Moon.
• United Launch Alliance, a joint venture between Boeing and Lockheed-Martin, has suggested replacing Ares I with the "heavy" version of the Delta IV evolved expendable launch vehicle, which is already in existence, but doesn't have all the extra bells and whistles to make it "human rated."
• A group of NASA and non-NASA people have proposed a Space Shuttle-based archiecture called DIRECT, which would maximize existing equipment by putting four Space Shuttle Main Engines on the bottom of an external tank, and then putting the Orion on top. A new upper stage would give the Orion enough oomph to get it into orbit for lunar missions. For lunar missions, two DIRECT vehicles would be used, with one launching Altair, one launching Orion and the Earth departure stage (I believe).
• Others have suggested using wholly commercial launchers and spacecraft to support the International Space Station via the Commercial Orbital Transportation Services (COTS) program. The most likely candidate, if proven successful, would be SpaceX's Falcon 9 launcher and six-person Dragon spacecraft.

And no doubt there are others. An impressive array of choices--more than America had ten years ago, at any rate--but how does one decide? I myself am a proud, self-proclaimed "English major" (M.A. University of Central Florida '02, lest you think my low-key pose is real). I'm not an engineer, I'm a policy guy.

It seems to me that the bigger picture is being lost in the swirl over the choice of rockets. Everyone's so concerned about the "horse race" between the various vehicles that they're overlooking where the horses might or should be going, which is really the most important part of this discussion. I love our space science programs--the rovers, the orbiters, the telescopes--but I would dearly love to see human beings (yes, Americans) plant Old Glory into an asteroid or Mars or the Moon again. We did it when I was born, f'r gosh sakes, certainly we can improve on that performance after 40 years!

But the bigger questions aren't just about flags and footprints. We had that, won a race, and then closed down the production lines for the Moon rockets because we thought the job was done. As a space advocate, beg to differ. We've learned more about the Moon in the past 40 years. We know that the place is rich in energy, actual (solar) and potential (helium-3, which can be used for fusion). It might have water ice, which would make long-term bases and settlements possible up there. That's what the LCROSS mission will hopefully find out in October.

But what are we going to do when we're up there? That's where the conversation has always fallen flat (one can see the results in the International Space Station). Here's a step-by-step progression of what's possible with current technology--whichever rockets we choose to build:

1. Science performed by robotic vehicles, including Earth observation, planetary science, and astronomy.
2. Robotic "virtual" entertainment (e.g. tele-operated rovers moving around the Moon under the control of private citizens back on Earth).
3. Human exploration of other worlds, including the Moon, asteroids, and Mars.
4. Space resource development, including investigating space solar power, helium-3, platinum-group metals, and anything we haven't seen yet for use in solving problems here on Earth.
5. Basic science taking advantage of the near-vacuum and low gravity of the Moon or other bodies in the solar system.
6. Manufacturing of new products taking advantage of the space environment.
7. Handling or storage of materials too dangerous or precious to leave on Earth, such as nuclear waste, biotechnology, nanotechnology, cultural artifacts, or genetic "libraries" of all life on Earth.
8. Space commerce, including space hotels, tourism, off-world banks, and space salvage--none of which require a permanent human presence in space to maintain.
9. Space settlement, meaning permanent human habitations in orbit or on the Moon, Mars, or asteroids for scientific, commercial, or cultural reasons.

If I were President, I'd want to learn from the panel where the country should go and what we should do in space. From there, the hardware selections become more or less academic. If I had my choice, I'd keep shooting for the Moon, Mars, and beyond--let NASA keep doing what it's doing. I don't have a problem with a "mixed fleet" to low Earth orbit and the Space Station until the commercial sector gets established. Redundant capability to LEO might not be efficient, but it gives the country several options. But we need to keep NASA focused on the frontiers of science and engineering. Otherwise, what's the darned point?