MAIN ARTICLE: "Alien comet 'invaded solar system' " - Headline from Skymania.
This can only mean one of two things: Go buy a roll of tin foil and start making hats or buy a new telescope.
Poll Results: The Weekly round-up of last week's polls. What won the week? Scroll down to read last weeks summary, click subscribe to get more timely results.
Star Trek: In the News Jonathon Frakes "I've very optimistic about the new movie,"
Yesterday's Interesting Comments: Yesterday's topic was Space Based Solar Power (SBSP) or SSP - Space Solar Power. Expecting, as always, a good debate, the best "lines" actually came from the mention of one word .... Shatner!
"Shatner's saving grace is He'll do anything in front of an audience." palantir
"Scroll down to read what Shatner is up to." I don't think I've had less of an incentive to scroll down in a long time... " Arken
Scroll down for great comments on Space Solar Power.
Today's Poll: Saturday in Space - 'Americans in Space' Weekly Tracking Poll on NASA funding.
What a shocking headline to read in Skymaina: "Alien comet 'invaded solar system' " For me that means two things. The first, the word ~~ A L I E N ~~ and the flashbacks of every spooky Sci-Fi movie ever watched from pre-teen years, to post teen and on to middle age.
From Classic Movies like "The Day the Earth Stood Still (1951)"
(Trailer from the 1951 B&W version - picture starts at 25 seconds)
to Close Encounters of the Third Kind. Everyone has "their" movie when they conjure up visions of an alien life form.
The second thing that title brought to mind was comets. Comets, asteroids and other space rocks are my number one paranoia. If there is a species ender, a big rock falling from space is it.
Several Mass Extinction Events have occured in Earth's history. The leading theory in some of those events is, that's right, a big rock falling from space. Now you know my paranoia.
If a species wants to last long term, they will have to learn how to deal with rocks from space. It is my belief that the faster America gets "boots on the ground" out in space, the better I will feel personally, and that the ENTIRE Earth's population will be safe.
Only in America is something like this possible. Because only in America do we have what it takes to think those grand ideas, those impossible tasks. Like a past leader of the Progressive Democrats once said:
"We set sail on this new sea because there is new knowledge to be gained, and new rights to be won, and they must be won and used for the progress of all people." John F. Kennedy.
"Comets have a variety of different orbital periods, ranging from a few years, to hundreds of thousands of years, while some are believed to pass through the inner Solar System only once before being thrown out into interstellar space. Short-period comets are thought to originate in the Kuiper Belt, or associated scattered disc,[1] which lie beyond the orbit of Neptune. Long-period comets are believed to originate at a very much greater distance from the Sun, in a cloud (the Oort cloud) consisting of debris left over from the condensation of the solar nebula. Comets are thrown from these outer reaches of the Solar System inwards towards the Sun by gravitational perturbations from the outer planets (in the case of Kuiper Belt objects) or nearby stars (in the case of Oort Cloud objects), or as a result of collisions."
"US astronomer is suggesting that it did not originate in our own solar system but was instead captured from another star." Skymania
PANSPERMIA
"Panspermia (Gk. πάς/πάν (pas/pan, all) and σπέρμα (sperma, seed)) is the hypothesis that "seeds" of life exist already all over the Universe, that life on Earth may have originated through these "seeds", and that they may deliver or have delivered life to other habitable bodies.
The related but distinct idea of exogenesis (Gk. εξω (exo, outside) and γενεσις (genesis, origin)) is a more limited hypothesis that proposes life on Earth was transferred from elsewhere in the Universe but makes no prediction about how widespread it is. Because the term "panspermia" is more well-known, it tends to be used in reference to what should strictly speaking be called exogenesis."
There are basically two kinds of people, those that think the galaxy is awash in life and those that think we are it.
For me, the galaxy is filled with life and we are still living under our first lily pad in the great lake of Orion's Arm.
Odd Comet Possibly from Another Star System
"The bizarre chemical make-up of a comet suggests the blob of ice is an interloper, possibly flung into our solar system from beyond, astronomers now say, adding that the wacky comet is forcing them to create a new category for such objects.
The comet, called Machholz 1, was discovered in 1986 by Donald Machholz of Loma Prieta, Calif. Since then, the icy denizen has made a few appearances, including one in 2007."
Lowell Observatory astronomer confirms new class of comets
"Comet 96P/Machholz 1's anomalous compositional characteristics help pinpoint its origin to one of three intriguing scenarios. David Schleicher, Lowell Observatory planetary astronomer, measured abundances of five molecular species in the comae of 150 comets and discovered that one comet, 96P/Machholz 1, has an unusual chemistry. The cause of this chemical anomaly remains unknown, but each of three possible explanations yields important but differing constraints on the evolution of comets. "
"A large fraction of comets in our own solar system have escaped into interstellar space, so we expect that many comets formed around other stars would also have escaped," said Schleicher. "Some of these will have crossed paths with the Sun, and Machholz 1 could be an interstellar interloper."Lowell Observatory
Lowell Observatory began a long term program in the early 1990's that identified two classes of comets by their varying composition.
"One class, containing the majority of observed comets, has a composition called "typical." Most members of this typical class have long resided in the Oort Cloud at the fringes of our solar system, but they are believed to have formed amidst the giant planets, particularly among Saturn, Uranus, and Neptune. Other members of this compositional class arrived from the Kuiper Belt, located just beyond Neptune.
The second compositional class of comets has varying depletions in two of the five chemical species measured. Because both depleted molecules, C2 and C3, are composed wholly of carbon atoms, this class was named "carbon-chain depleted." Moreover, nearly all comets in this second class have orbits consistent with their having arrived from the Kuiper Belt. For this and other reasons, the cause of the depletion is believed to be associated with the conditions that existed when the comets formed, perhaps within an outer, colder region of the Kuiper Belt."
President Elect Barack Obama should be leading America into commercial space development for the 21st Century. I hope, with Bill Richardson and other advisors to the President Elect, they can help America build the infrastructure of tomorrow that are Nation sadly lacks.
America should have an IN SPACE, based vehicle to take advantage of space rocks swinging near us. The sooner we bring the inner solar system into both our scientific and economic spheres of activity, the safer humanity and America will be in the long run..
As I have proposed before and will again, NASA should do a three phase spiral design of an in space system.
PHASE I
A Low Earth Orbit
"(LEO) is generally defined as an orbit within the locus extending from the Earth’s surface up to an altitude of 2,000 km. Given the rapid orbital decay of objects below approximately 200 km, the commonly accepted definition for LEO is between 160 - 2000 km (100 - 1240 miles) above the Earth's surface"
TO:
Geosynchronous orbit Vehicle.
"(GEO) an orbit around the Earth with an orbital period matching the Earth's sidereal rotation period[1]. This synchronization means that for an observer at a fixed location on Earth, a satellite in a geosynchronous orbit returns to exactly the same place in the sky at exactly the same time each day. In principle, any orbit with a period equal to the Earth's rotational period is technically geosynchronous, however, the term is almost always used[2] to refer to the special case of a geosynchronous orbit that is circular (or nearly circular) and at zero (or nearly zero) inclination, that is, directly above the equator. This is sometimes called a geostationary orbit."
LEO2GEO Vehicle. This vehicle would fly between 200 miles and 25000 miles above the earth. A fuel depot would be developed by NASA, in conjuction with the private sector, and supplied by the commercial private sector. Once routine gas and go operations have been established, start:
Phase 2
Lagrange Point Vehicle or LPV. More on that in another Diary.
POLL RESULTS:
Final Results of this week's polls saw Space Solar Power the big winner.
55% Of the DKOS readers who took the poll favored this option. One of the strongest results 'Americans in Space' polls have shown.
42% Monday's combined pro Lunar:
40% Tuesday's combined Space Tourism:
50% Wednesday's combined pro Mars:
26% Thursday"s combined LEO2GEO - Satellite service and repair vehicle:
76% Friday's combined Solar Space Power:
SERIES 3:
Mon: Moon, Tues: Space Tourism, Wed: Mars, Thur: LEO2GEO, Fri: SSP
SERIES 2:
Poll #1 Space Solar Power (SSP) 27%
Poll #2 Space Solar Power (SSP) 33%
Poll #3 Nuclear Engines..............33%
Poll #4 Battery Systems..............18%
Poll #5 Battery Systems..............25%
SPACE SOLAR POWER (SSP)
SERIES 1:
Poll #1 Mars Base 34%
Poll #2 Moon Base 30%
Poll #3 Moon Base 40%
Poll #4 LEO Fuel Depot 38%
Poll #5 Moon base 30%
MOON BASE 28% - 31.8% (adjusted)
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STAR TREK NEWS: Frakes On 'Star Trek XI'. December 6, 2008
"The success of Star Trek XI might lead to possibilities for the Star Trek franchise in general, says Jonathan Frakes.
As reported by iFMagazine, Frakes is optimistic that Star Trek XI will do well and that the success may open the door for other Star Trek projects. "I've very optimistic about the new movie," said Frakes. "I'm a big fan of his [Abrams] as a storyteller and I was there and it looked great. I was lucky enough to visit the set and was overwhelmed how beautiful the [Enterprise] bridge was." - By T'Bonz Trek Today
YESTERDAY'S INTERESTING COMMENTS:
The topic yesterday was Space Solar Power (SSP) or Space Based Solar Power (SBSP) and it was a lively debate. Ferris Valyn commented that:
"You should've learned plumbing - I always figured out how I wanted to zone it, but then forgot. More seriously:
For these reasons, 2.45 GHz has been proposed as being a reasonable compromise. However, that frequency results in large antenna sizes at the GEO distance. A loitering stratospheric airship has been proposed to receive higher frequencies (or even laser beams), converting them to something like 2.45 GHz for retransmission to the ground. This proposal has not been as carefully evaluated for engineering plausibility as have other aspects of SPS design; it will likely present problems for continuous coverage. Solar power satellite
Now, the article did hit on another alternative, which is something not necessarily very popular to talk about, but is both feasible, and not necessarily nearly as dangerous as it sounds - direct laser transmission."
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Direct Laser Transmission? Convert Space Solar Power into a laser beam and send it to Earth? We will have to learn more about that. SJLeonidas provided a link from a Wired.Com article"Researchers Beam 'Space' Solar Power in Hawaii". Good read.
Ferris also provided a link to a great article:
Why Implementing the Space Option Is Necessary for Society
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There was also an informative comment on Luna Based Solar Power:
Rimjob
"I did a diary on the idea of Moon based solar power some years back. As I recall, in testing, there were no negative effects to animal tissue that came into contact with the beams that would be used in this kind of setup.
A scientist by the name of David Criswell has been one of the major proponents. His idea is that since "Moon Dust" has necessary elements to construct solar cells, plus a near vacuum environment.....
...Criswell envisions that large fields of made-on-the-moon solar cells can energize sets of microwave transmitters. These transmitters would be in synch to deliver microwave power to receivers on Earth. In order to provide inexpensive electric energy to Earth, most of the lunar-situated hardware must be manufactured on the spot, Criswell said. Some high-technology items would be ferried to the moon from Earth, he said. Pairs of solar farms would be planted in the lunar highlands, on the east and west limbs of the moon, near the equator.
As part of the Lunar Solar Power System, beams of microwaves from the moon are directed to receiving antennas on Earth called "rectennas". They operate when they are in view of the moon. Simple reflectors or active re-transmitters in Earth orbit can redirect energy beams to ground rectennas at times when they are not in sight of the moon.
According to him & others it is technologically feasible at this moment.....
Criswell estimates that in 2050, a population of about 10 billion would require about 20 terawatts of power. The moon receives more than 13,000 terawatts of solar power, and harnessing just one percent could satisfy Earth's power needs, he says.....Successful Earth-moon power beams are already in use, he points out in the current issue of The Industrial Physicist. A radio telescope operating from the Arecibo Observatory in Puerto Rico regularly uses a beam of microwaves to produce images of the moon.
"In principle it is perfectly feasible, but the problem is cost," says Paul Lowman, a geologist at NASA's Goddard Space Flight Center. "Criswell's project will need a lot of people up there, and that will be expensive."
It's estimated that all of this would cost anywhere from $150-$500 billion dollars. Since that's just the estimate, it's more likely it would probably be more than that after cost overruns & other unforseen issues that always happen.
Also, in theory, the microwave array could be used to push a ship equipped with a Solar Sail, as well as transmit power to any human settlement within a reasonable stellar distance (somewhere out around Jupiter). I think also read one story saying a microwave array of this order might also come in handy if Earth was in danger of being hit by an asteroid or comet."
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It is my belief that it would be better to put satellites in GEO rather then on the moon. If our intention was to construct the solar panels on the moon, then do not launch them back to Earth, install them on the moon. If need be, we can relay the energy back.
SATURDAY in SPACE: Weekly Tracking Poll on NASA Spending
This is the third weekly tracking poll for NASA funding.
Sat Nov 22, 2008, Sat Nov 29, 2008